Day 2

That's right, 'eeemrdg'. I did mention that the story was in Icelandic, didn't I?

Day 1

And we're off. Be sure to return tomorrow for that sensational second word.

Are you sitting comfortably?

The story is written, subject to final tinkering, but before it begins I thought I should explain a couple of points. My initial, unconsidered plan was to try to avoid using duplicate words so that every day was unique. Then I started writing and found it next to impossible. I suppose it can be done, but it wouldn't sound like normal English.

I was also planning to use as few 'boring' words as I could get away with - illustrating a load of ands or buts didn't seem like an exciting prospect, but again I found them unavoidable when it came down to it and frankly I haven't given myself long enough to tit around with it. There are in fact a great deal of dull words - some would say all of them - but then I reasoned that it's hardly the most exciting project anyway and who's going to complain that it's worse than they expected?

Finally, I'm not much of a writer. You aren't likely to be slowly dazzled by the prose. As long as you realise that, no one should get hurt.

A mammoth task at any bit rate

I have treated myself to a new mp3 player. My old one is in good working order but I wanted more capacity in order to do something I've wanted to do for ages - have my entire CD collection on one portable device.

I don't buy many CDs these days. Spotify has helpfully removed the gamble of buying a record on spec, and whether or not that encourages bands to try harder I'm calling it a good thing.

If an album passes its streaming audition I'm still only likely to buy a hard copy if it's a band or artist I really like. You know, out of respect. I do have the genuine (if fairly lame) excuse that I'm running out of shelf space, but I remain one of those nasty hypocrites who downloads most of his music while bemoaning the death of the high street record shop. I really can't explain myself - the idea that one day there will be no physical albums at all makes me want to cry, vomit and then cry into the vomit but there I am, helping to nail down the coffin lid. I still have a turntable though, if that offsets the heresy at all.

Anyway, back to my daft desire to compress my entire collection. I haven't counted lately, but there must be almost 900 discs, a very large proportion of which I haven't listened to in years. So why not be more selective and avoid shelling out for a 64GB player? Well, I've got about 150 albums on my existing 8GB device and I always find myself wanting to listen to something that's not on there. So I thought, Sod it, I'm going to eliminate that possibility. But you can't do 90 per cent, it has to be all or nothing, which is why I've spent the better part of the past two days ripping CDs in Windows Media Player, including those I know with certainty I will never listen to again. For some reason I don't find it tedious - I like challenging the online database with obscure titles, though it's annoying to have to enter track listings manually. I've also made some interesting discoveries, namely albums I had no idea I owned. Remember The Electric Soft Parade? Six By Seven? The Distillers? No, neither did I.

The really daft thing is that I usually listen to mp3s when I'm in bed. The player almost never leaves my flat.

I have actually given this thought

Hey reader! How would you like to be told a story, one word at a time, with 24 hour pauses inbetween, over the course of an entire calendar year?

Well Graham, that sounds like one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. Why do you ask?

Because it's going to be my new project, starting on January 1st!

Ha ha. You're joking, obviously.

No I'm not! It's better than it sounds though - each word will be artistically rendered to give the whole thing some visual oompf!

Nope, still among the worst ideas ever.

You really think so?

Yes.

Fuck it, I'm doing it anyway.

Good for you. [deletes bookmark]

Janice, take a bow

Today I discovered a remarkable project by a woman called Janice Whaley. She has set herself a target to record cover versions of every single record by the Smiths before the end of this year. Why is that remarkable? Because she is doing it purely with dozens of layered vocals to replicate the instrumentation. I thought it sounded a bit naff until I checked it out for myself.

Each song is apparently created with between 30 and 50 separate layered tracks, some of which mimic basic percussion and others that are pitch shifted to resemble basslines. They take about 30 hours each to complete.

Perhaps it's just because I'm such a big Smiths fan myself, but I find them rather amazing. I admire anyone with that kind of dedication to a project, especially when the results are so impressive.

http://thesmithsproject.blogspot.com/

Starry starry night

It's strange, but only a couple of days after thinking that I'd like to try some astro-photography I got the perfect night for it - cloudless, windless and mild. So I ventured out at one o'clock this morning and found a clearing in the forest to set up my tripod. It's slightly unsettling being in the forest in pitch darkness but to look up and see the stars so clearly is genuinely awe-inspiring.

I just wish I knew a bit more about the night sky. The cloudy vertical band in the image above is the Milky Way, but that's about all I can tell you. Identifying constellations amid such a busy sky is difficult and I wasn't sure if any planets were in view. Can anyone help?

What, for example, is the cloudy star circled in red above? It looks like a supernova but I'd be surprised if such a thing was visible to the naked eye. And the dense cluster circled in green must be easily identifiable, but not by me. The top photograph was taken facing north west, the second facing west.

I took some other shots where I popped a flashgun during the exposure to show some detail in the trees. They didn't really work but it occurred to me that a distant observer might interpret strange flashes in the forest as something other-worldly, especially round here.

Light pollution is the biggest problem. It may have seemed pitch black to me, but I was still only a couple of miles from a load of street lamps. If you can get far enough away from populated areas then it's possible to capture images like this. The only places you could get close to that in the UK are parts of Wales and Scotland, but it's usually cloudy there.

Anyway, there are a couple more images on my Flickr page if you're interested.