We've been uncharacteristically sociable this week, and have barely spent any time in the flat except to collapse into bed at an ungodly hour and rise at an even more demonic one. A couple of nights ago we went to see Russell Brand and Noel Fielding host an evening of comedy at the Royal Albert Hall. Our seats were in a rather odd position: we were perched in the seats reserved for the choir during an orchestral performance, and had slightly surreal view of the stage and – even more curiously – the audience. It didn't diminish our enjoyment in the least; the only genuinely weird part was that some film clips (including some of The Moon) were shown on a huge screen that we couldn't see, and our only experience of these clips was watching a screen-lit audience oooh-ing and giggling at the action.


There are more such pictures of the Albert Hall here.

Creative Suite 3 is finally here, and MacUser has spent weeks with the final betas to delivery the definitive verdict on this huge collection of applications. Go and read the reviews, and see what's new, what hasn't changed, and if you should upgrade. If you have a Digg account, please Digg this story too.

Sure, there are a few bum notes, and sure, the tempo's a bit pie-eyed, but this is nevertheless one of the coolest things I have ever seen. It's long but well worth watching all the way through. Exploring the linked videos in YouTube suggests that this is not a new phenomenon, and Nicest Man In The World™ Simon Handby pointed me towards a very professional – though not, somehow, as fun – orchestral version by, he thinks, the Tokyo Philharmonic. What fun, as her Majesty is apparently wont to say.

Today's release of an update to Mac OS X has made me an irrationally happy man: it includes support for a swathe – a veritable slew, even, dare I say it, a raft — of hitherto unsupported mobile phones. My spiffy K800i is included, so here I am, transferring my 800+ long list of contacts, plus my diary, to my mobile. You have no idea how happy this has made me.


10.4.9 also includes support for USB webcams which is pretty exciting; can't wait to put it through its paces.

Necessity, they say, is the mother of invention, and it is by careful application of this theorem that we arrive at this photograph...

...in which Mrs Receding Hairline has shielded herself from the glare of the early afternoon sun with the application of this handy tshirt-cum-hood in order to check the directions to Atlantis. We've dubbed it iFalcon, as it follows on from her occasional habit of wearing a tshirt on her head during the night to block out the light, something like the little hoods birds of prey wear in falconry.

By 'Atlantis', we don't, I should point out, mean the lost city – the Interweb isn't that good – but rather an arts supplies store in Whitechapel*. Why they didn't call it ARTlantis, I have no idea. Clearly a missed opportunity.

On the way back from buying exciting things like paints and canvases, she was again telling the story of one of her pupils who, at sixteen, had been asked to model by Lucien Freud. She turned it down, and while acknowledging that sixteen might indeed have been a bit young to get yer kecks off in front of an old man, both my wife and I agreed that if at any point an artist of Freud's calibre had ever expressed an interest in painting us, we'd have jumped at the chance, and to hell with the risk of low-grade sexploitation. Imagine being able to look at that picture when you were sitting in a bath chair wearing a muffler – by which I mean 'old' not merely of an eccentric bent.

Mrs R H put it best: "Even if he wanted to paint me with a banana up my ass, I'd be fine with that."

Amen to that, sista.

I haven't, incidentally, neglected the FFC; results are still being collated – you can still vote! – and I'll report back soon.


* The first time I am aware of hearing 'Whitechapel' named was in a song by Edith Piaf, in which she pronounces it something like Wet-chapelle; it always sounded impossibly romantic to me, though I have been disabused of this notion following today's visit.