Music To Your Ears

I dug out my old OPM album just now, since Martin's coming round tomorrow and all, and for some reason I'd completely forgotten that they had an interlude on it called "15 Minutes" which I absolutely loved back then and still do today. I can't find the full lyrics to it, though - it goes something like:

Fifteen minutes with you
And I wanna slit my wrists
I can't believe we used to kiss
I can't believe I used to put up with
All of your bullshit

And then it degrades into mumbling and spluttering, basically - or at least to the best of my understanding. If anyone can actually decipher that, that'd be great.

Stuff That's Relevant

If you've read my blasphemy below, you might want to check this out that I just found on NN2S.

If you punish a person
for dreaming his dream
don't expect him to thank or forgive you
- The Mountain Goats

Pronounced How?

So yeah, I downloaded Free Bird - it's good but Stairway is mooch batter. Just thought you'd all be hanging on my words about that.

A Vowel, Please

There's just under three weeks left until my destiny is secured for another few years... I think the tiny amount of trepidation I'm feeling is being quashed by hope, although I'm sure that'll give way nearer the time.

Existential Rumination

I've been having rather intense, deeply theological, philosophical, and above all else, procrastinatory conversations with one of my supervisors recently (he's called Ben, and that tells you absolutely everything you need to know about him. He's also the Metallica guy).

Basically he asks me a question based on his Christian beliefs, such as 'is there such a thing as good and evil as polar opposites?' and I give it a moments thought and come out with something off the top of my head that counteracts it - or at least, in my view. Mainly these theories revolve around stuff that I've concluded after writing that piece A Conversation With God a while back, based on reality as perception. As to good and evil, for example, I explain that I don't believe that any person acts under a knowingly evil agenda - the father who rapes his four-year-old daughter, for example, only thinks that he loves her very much and this is the only way he can show it, or the suicide bomber thinks that he is on a mission from on high. Definitions of good and evil are governed by the masses and the majority, and one person's actions are only evil from another's perspective. As much as Hitler must never be brought into any debate, I'm sure that he thought he was doing the right thing and all who opposed him were trying to bring down his righteous regime.

This brings us to the question of truth, something Ben loves to discuss - surely truth, then, can only be one's perception of reality, and if reality is only a perception of truth, this leaves some sort of existential paradox with layers of meaning I can't even begin to interpret. For the devout Catholic, for example, their belief goes against all Darwinian teaching. Their faith provides their truth, which negates scientific explanations. For them, that is what is real, because of how they see it. For the Darwinian student, of course, there is proof of evolutionary theory and none for a creator god. While there is the perceived advantage of 'fact' for this, there is the profound lack of faith - however, this is what they see and how their minds process it, and for them - a truth. Their reality.

What my beliefs are getting some way to explaining is that both camps can be right - not by some timeline where God created and let evolve, because there are errata in that theory above and beyond what I'd like to pretend I know - but by the fact that reality is not what exists, but how what does exist is interpreted. And indeed once that is understood, we must then see that existence is nothing but the promise - or premise - of substance with no grounding or backup, and that what we perceive may not even exist - although of course, it does to us, as that is our reality, and we try not to get too bogged down in the circular meaning of it all.


I think it's clear by now that I need more meditation on this subject. I'll just leave you with this - I'm sure anyone reading this has toyed with the reasoning that everything's a dream, and that how would you know if you couldn't wake up - especially those of you who have been watching the Matrix rather too intensely than is good for you. Keep that in mind while re-reading this post, then go read 'The Bully' by Ian McEwan. Then give me your thoughts.

Gird Your Loins For Love

Okay, so this 'hot coffee' controversy. I know, everyone on the Internet (even the eight year old kids who only ever go on Neopets) is talking about this thing, either defending Rockstar or shooting them down.

What gets me is the fact that a simulated scene of sex which you don't really actively take part in (you press up and down rhythmically, which is about it), and in which the protagonist is fully clothed, is somehow worse than the entire amalgam of the whole game's ethos put together. Somehow, this brief encounter (and I mean extremely brief, your stamina stat must be way down, CJ) is more appalling than the fact that you can drive into a nearby neighbourhood with four of your gang and gun down/run over every gang member in sight. The fact that you can kill random people in the street with your fists and then steal their cash. you could even have 'sex' beforehand with a prostitute, and then kill her to get your money back.

Missions are available for you to break into people's houses/military bases and steal WMDs. You can break into the airport and steal a plane. Go basejumping and squash yourself into a bloody mess in the ground.

But somehow, all this is fine because it's been done before. But suddenly OH NO, THIS GAME COULD BE PLAYED BY PEOPLE UNDER 18 AND IT HAS SEX IN IT WHICH YOU HAVE TO BE RATHER TALENTED TO VIEW.

So suddenly, the game gets rated differently in America. Now you have to wait a WHOLE YEAR LONGER to get it.

Is it me, or is that the ESRB's fault for rating it wrongly in the first place? The BBFC and PEGI clearly rate it as 18. The ESRB, however, have some weird system that means that only sex can grant an AO rating (such as BMX XXX, for example, which didn't actually create as much steam, weirdly).


This all seems a lot of fuss for a game that should have been 18-rated from the beginning.

Someone You May Know

This is Peter Ostrum. You may recognise him because of his role in the original Charlie And The Chocolate Factory - although bizarrely, he's not starred in a single film since. He's now a vet.

That's right. He specialises in the equine and bovine area of expertise - that's horses and cows, to you and me.


When I found this picture, it struck me how much he looks like Mario... there's more than a passing resemblance.

Song Lyrics That Are Amusing

I can't tie my laces
I don't play the flute
My car is an automatic
I can't paint my nails
I never applaud
I'm not very good at Twister
And when my laptop crashes
I can't even press control-alt-delete
Cos I've got one hand

A Quick PhotoShop That Turned Out Okay

This is Clark from work. I'm quite pleased with how this turned out, actually.

An Extremely Short Story

"Why," asked the youth, surrounded as I was by a close-knit group of friends, "do you persist in buying the cheapest bread available to you? You're obviously rich, bedecked with bullion; you can afford the good stuff. Why do you need to seek out the best bargain available when you don't need to?"
"Because mah momma didn't raise no fool, boy!" I replied rather curtly, taking a long swig from my glass of milk.

fan material.

So I read through this Spider-Man book. I was really impressed. Not only with Peter David's writing style - for example, justification for the spider biting Parker's hand, or a reason why MJ was told she needed acting lessons by a soap opera, or that Flash's ring was a 'steady' ring, but by the amount of foreshadowing.

I mean, wow. Couple of excerpts for you.


"But... 'Green Goblin'," Peter said in weak protest. "It sounds so..."
"We have to make the name more memorable! And nothing makes people remember a name better than alliteration!" J. Jonah Jameson said.
"Do you really think so?" Peter Parker asked the nearest bystander.
"I wouldn't know," Robbie Robertson commented. Then J.J.'s secretary, Betty Brant, informed him that he had a conference call with the noted scientists Bruce Banner and Reed Richards.

"Man... looks like... some sort of cocoon..."
"What," DeFalco said skeptically, his voice thick with disbelief, "you're telling me that these jokers were nailed by a giant caterpillar?"
Owsley rubbed some trailing threads between is fingers, noting the adhesion. "Or," he said with an air of great significance, "a giant spider, man."
"Great," snorted DeFalco. "Well, it's better than last week, when you read about those soldiers getting trashed in New Mexico and said some sort of incredible hulk did it."

Peter tried, really tried, to view the situation the way the professor probably viewed it. On that basis, he could supposed he could understand why Connors had just given him the heave-ho.
On the other hand, part of him, a nasty, insidious part, couldn't help but hope that iguana would mutate, bite Connors, and turn him into a giant lizard. Then Connors would get to see life from Peter Parker's point of view.
As if that would ever happen...

A young man with dirty blond hair, a camera slung around his neck, and a generally shabby appearance, emerged from the hall and stalked across the newsroom. he stopped when he saw Peter staring at him, saw the camera bag slung over Peter's shoulder. "What're you lookin' at, greenhorn?" he asked in a voice filled with pure venom.
"And Brock! Would it kill you to get a decent suit!?"


If you don't get those references, then meh. They weren't meant for you. I just love this kind of thing.

An update on Safety Dan and his Monkey to arrive after my jaunt to Italy. See you all back here - same Bat-time, same Bat-channel.

rambler's return

So okay. I really should've written in this thing before now, but with one thing and another, I... you know. Haven't.

I haven't actually been on the Internet in a few days. I've been working every weekday that I can, and tiring myself out so I'm going to bed pretty much as soon as I get home. That goes double for Wednesday night, when I was actually in the shop until midnight, stocking the shop to bursting so that the managing director can come in for three minutes and tell us that batteries is full to bursting and that's good, but it's a shame that homeware is bare, or some shit. So yeah, I was knackered.

And now I'm going on holiday again for a week or so and when I get back I just KNOW that my section will be completely clarked. Ah well... it goes on.

Clarked, by the way, is a new word - a neologism, if you will - basically meaning 'fucked'. It comes from the incompetence of one Clark Kent, a moniker you may remember for being a nickname for a co-worker of mine. If you can work your way through that sentence, I'll give you a clap on the back, too.

So anyway, I've been getting home later than normal and just hauling myself up to bed. I do, though, often find myself completely knackered due to staying up past midnight after I'm home playing on GTA San Andreas.

Yeah, you heard me. I've defected. I bought Julie's PS2 off her (although technically she still needs to be paid), as she said she only really used it for a DVD player, and bought a couple of games in Blackpool - Pro Evo 3, and GTA3 to start. Then I found a car boot sale, and there resided inside a copy of San Andreas. For a mere twelve pounds.
After the easiest bit of bartering I've ever done in my life I got it for a tenner. Not exactly the best discount ever but it MATTERED TO ME, especially since you pay twice that for a preowned copy in Bits.

So I got it home and played it, and we've held Pro Evo tournaments and all sorts. I must say, I'm still not as impressed with the quality of it as I am with the GameCube, although I suppose it's the exclusive games that make the console, and the PS2 has some awesome titles - but it doesn't seem as fun. Having gotten used to four-player Mario Kart, I can't play turn-based two-player football. It's bizarre.

Still, the exclusive games available for it are not - I repeat, NOT - to be sniffed at. GTA deserves to stand on its own, of course, but there's also MGS and things like Burnout. There's also Eidos' fine Free Running, out by the end of the year, a graffiti game which - annoyingly - I can't remember the name of, and God of War, which I bought just today. That, my dear friends, is the game that Prince of Persia: Warror Within always wanted to be. It's just a great deal of fun. Nothing beats whipping a Hydra's head about like it was a toy, then impaling it on a piece of scenery otherwise ignored.

Anyway. As I said above, this'll be my second holiday in about two or three weeks. Last week eleven of us went to Blackpool. I should really have posted this earlier so more people could read it, but whatever. Never mind, I say.

It was fun, I guess... or at least as fun as it could be. I have no doubt that with Viggars and Laura able to come it would have been so much better... at least, for us. I don't know about the rest of them, as they all seem to be preoccupied with the fact that OMG the group split up and THEY SAID THEY WOULDN'T. I felt kinda lost, atually, like I didn't really know anyone - and those that I did, weren't there or disappeared. But meh. LET'S ALL GO OFF AND SLEEP WITH RANDOM GUYS ON A STAG NIGHT.

I swear - I wasn't a gamer, and the arcades weren't so prolific, that weekend would have driven me to insanity. I ended up playing mother - again. At least Dan provided some entertainment - entertainment that deserves another post.

So, anyway. Second holiday. We're going to stay in a little place near Ancona, Italy for four or five days - me, the parents, the brother and the grandmother. It's supposed to be absolutely beautiful. I'm going to knock out a few sketches while I'm there, although I doubt that I'll be able to capture the beauty of the place with my mere etchings. Mother's going to try her hand at watercolour, and I think I might also have a bit of a dabble, although I don't expect any great results.

No matter what, the final ones will end up on my DeviantArt page, so you can all laugh at my efforts.


I've been clipping random things out of newspapers recently. I did it once before in the old iteration of this blog, and it worked quite well. For some reason, though, it's only ever the Daily Star that provides such gems. That has to be my favourite little article of all time, though. The gist of it was basically this:
A nun has given up the holy life to marry a man in Northern Italy who texted her by mistake. Love blossomed when the Sister texted back.

I love shit like that.


I got that paper at work - Clark always leaves some rag or other lying on the table - and it's reminded me of something. A bloke at work mentioned such a thing as a 'deep sea diver'. It is, of course, Cockney rhyming slang, but I absolutely love it (for the slow among you, it's a five-pound note) for being so inefficient.

Went into work today to update my bank details. Turns out I need my account number, which, annoyingly, isn't printed on my card. So I traipsed all the way back up to the bank, got there at 1:05 - and it closed at 1pm. I got myself a Stilton, kiwi and mayonnaise sandwich (which surpasses the cream cheese, salami and gherkin as the best sandwich of all time) and consoled myself. It just wasn't my day.
The day before, I'd bought Another Code: Two Memories, a game that I'd earmarked for the DS for a while. I was really, really looking forward to it, not least that I could play it on the journey to Italy.

I completed the damn thing in four and a half hours. I was absolutely incensed. Thirty notes down the drain for only that. The difficulty didn't know where it was and the story didn't even resolve itself properly... I was just so damn annoyed at Nintendo, something which I'm not used to being, as they usually churn out quality games. This one, though, just smacked of rushed production. There's no other way to put it. The last level of the game was just one long scrolling text panel, with a half-arsed attempt at interaction, trying to hide the lack of game underneath.

Good God.

So I took it back this morning and got a refund, which I promptly spent on God of War. I'm so glad I did.


We're getting back from Italy late Friday, and I'd better make sure I get a lot of kip on the plane and car on the way over. Friday midnight, you see, is the release date for the Half Blood Prince, and you'd better believe I'll be in line for it, just like I was for the DS. It'll be the first time I've ever got a Potter book in hardback, come to think of it, but being able to read it as early as possible is definitely worth destroying the look of my nice paperback collection.

I remember bugging Mrs Leigh in the school library about the Order of the Phoenix before that was released, and it being put back for ages and ages... it's great how this one woman has managed to create an atmosphere around books that's usually only seen around forms of 'easy' entertainment, such as movies or - dare I say it - games. I wonder how long the waiting list is for it at Macc library?

In fact, I've been in the library much more often that usual recently. I've got a load of books out by Noam Chomsky, for example, for my A2 level revision. But I also took out a load of graphic novels to distract me from it. I reckon it worked.

Speaking of libraries, I managed to get an X-Men novel, also, and the Spider-Man film novelisation for 50p or something, which I was very impressed by. The latter also deserves its own post - I was VERY impressed with its writing.

We were there because I randomly met Ben in town to go and see Batman Begins with Peel... I believe on the last day of the exams. The second time I've seen it (as you amy have guessed, I'm a slight comic book nut), and I urge you all to go and see it as soon as you can. Far from being a great comic book film, it's the best Batman film ever made and easily in the top five films of this year. It's just... awesome - even if you're not a fan of comics, or Batman, or action, or anything. It's just great.


So yeah. It was Craig's prom today - in fact he's probably finishing it round about now, as I write this. He's got an after party to go to, as well, and I'm fairly sure he'll be getting laid. In all fairness, it's about bloody time, he's been desperate for that long. The fool. I jus hope he doesn't get smashed - not only will he not be able to perform, he won't be able to board the flight that we've so gallantly organised. It takes off at 10am, so he'll have a while to recover, but we're leaving here at 2 - and I don't relish having to do a Ben and stop every twenty metres so he can throw up on the kerbside. I really want this holiday to work - it's the last one we'll have abroad before the family splits off (namely me moving to Sheffield), and Dad can't really cut a holiday after this one, methinks.

Speaking of holidays, actually - and I can't believe I've waited till this long in the post to mention this - Siân and Joe are currently on holiday together. It was also Siân's birthday two days ago, and I can only imagine the romantic atmosphere he must have created for her.

They say the ultimate test for a relationship is whether you can go away together and rely, trust and depend on each other for as long as that holiday lasts. I know that Siân got annoyed with me if I just stayed over two nights in a row, hah. You guys - and I'm talking to you directly, now - you make much more sense than we ever did.

Many happy returns, Siân - I hope your adulthood brings you greater opportunity, and ultimately, success.



Man, this was the longest post ever. I don't know when I started writing it, but it's now ten past eleven... Just a quick type-up on this Spider-Man book, and I'm off. Gonna stay up until 2 playing God of War, I reckon... that's when we're leaving to pick up Grandma and go.