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Thursday 2nd July
Time to get out the bunting.
Paint your children green and set your own house on fire.
And that's just in preparation for breakfast.
Yes, it's nearly my birthday again and this time I have a few decrees as to what is expected next Friday.
One. There will be parades. This will include acrobats, elephants, pandas, gargantuan balloons shaped like cartoon characters and characters I have played on TV, floats decorated with important scenes from my life and marching bands.
Two. Tithes will be purchased. Primarily in solid gold, but games, dvds and books are also acceptable. See this list for more ideas.
Three. There will be cheerleaders. Of every nationality and creed. All wearing tiny skirts. In perfect formation cheering on the greatness of my birthday generally and me specifically.
Four. Beer and other alcoholic beverages will be provided in huge quantities at knock down prices. Though people should drink responsibly, they should be able to do so without a second mortgage.
Five. You will not be stupid. Even if you are stupid. You will walk around with an air of intelligence and speak of things like books, philosophy and lingerie. Discussion of sport is banned and will be punishable by public flaying. If you cannot manage some degree of looking like you are intelligent then you are permitted to sit out the day comfortably. Under a dungheap. That is on fire.
Six. Children under the age of 5 shall be painted green. This is not negotiable. They are to be disguised as shrubbery and made to blend in with the background. Children between the ages of 6 to 13 will be locked into one of the many theme parks in the country and not be let out until the following morning. Teenagers will be permitted to join the celebrations until such time as they say something offensive or insipid in which case they will be forced to live in France. Permanently.
Seven. Chocolates and Ice Cream will be delivered to the masses hourly on the hour until lunchtime, whereupon cocktails will be added to the list.
These are my decrees. Now go to and make it happen. Worldwide.
[ As a bit of political commentary, how much do you think all this would cost… as opposed to current government spending on things like …. Hmmm … overseas troop maintenance, health and safety legislation, alien research, university grants for foreign students and index-linked civil service pensions. Look, I didn't even mention expenses ]
Anyway, go to old sport, go to.
Tuesday 30th June
Frogger worries me.
I mean really, look at the world the frog lives in and tell me you wouldn't be a little bit worried living there too. I'll tell you something, if the choice comes between driving through that city and facing down a giant frog on the pavement then give me a decent pair of boots and a spiky umbrella cos I ain't getting on those roads.
Seriously, have you seen the way they drive over there?
I am moderately curious as to a city that shares it's roads not just between cars, suvs and busses but also four ton lorries and formula one cars. Is there NO driving restrictions on these roads?
More curious than that though is the 4 or five lanes of traffic of which the cars alternate which direction they're going in alternate lanes across the road. God help anyone in a central lane wanting to escape this motorway from hell, you'll be pulling in between cars that have no intention of stopping for you at any point and, more importantly, are going in the opposite direction.
There must have been some reason for this in the Froggerville urban planning offices, but I'm damned if I can work it out. Seemingly it's a recipe for death on all comers, locals and tourists alike.
Maybe that is the plan.
Maybe the insane traffic mortality rates are to attract tourists, who can never leave due to the poor road management and eventually die, thereby leaving the city with a profit of the worldly goods of said traveller and having to stump up nothing but a funeral.
I think I'm understanding the plot now. Normally, it could be said that funeral's are not cheap, but look, somebody has handily left an animal sanctuary with snapping flesh-eating turtles and mutant (sideways floating) crocodiles right next to the road.
Numnums for the lizards, methinks.
You might think this would be a dangerous place to put a dangerous wildlife sanctuary but you've obviously forgotten the road that runs right alongside it. Any toddler found on those grassy banks, or even swimming in the water is obviously more than a match for traffic of that magnitude, so I'd be more scared for the crocodiles becoming baby bootees by nightfall.
The sight of the logs does bring a little wrinkle to the plans though, since not only do they float in opposite directions on the same stretch of water (a feat quite difficult without some very interesting river bed architecture) but the logs floating on them are often over four times larger than the biggest lorry.
There must be some sort of logging camps, both up and down stream from Froggerville. Obviously the ones downstream are cutting very very softwood trees. Which defy flowing water. And the normal laws of physics.
OOOOO, I got it, the logs going downhill are actual logs, if hewn from mighty redwoods that have been standing for many centuries…. And the logs going uphill are not in fact logs, but salmon, cunningly disguised in huge log costumes to fool the crocodiles and fishermen of the city.
Not that many fishermen actually can be found on the banks of this mighty river. See the bit above about the four ton lorries.
Now if the salmon are disguising themselves, that must mean that they're hyper-intelligent salmon. Which would explain the logs floating in the opposite direction. Hyper-intelligent salmon would have absolutely no difficulty in climbing out of the water and chopping down endangered thousand-year old trees, hollowing them out and sending them downstream to their fellow salmony kin.
I can see nothing wrong with that, and furthermore I now demand to see the robot-fish-woodsman combo doing this work because it would be one of the more awesome sights in the world. Improved only by the addition of a flamethrower.
And possibly a barbeque.
All of it begins to add up now, especially when you look at the root cause, which is obviously radiation. In fact, the entire city of Froggerville must not only be a Freely Nuclear Zone, but it's obviously looking like it's the free dumping ground of all the nuclear waste material in the country, possibly the world.
The evidence could not be clearer.
... And ...
No wonder they call it Froggerville.
Sunday 28th June
If you're reading this then I'm going to assume you speak English, and if you do and you have any intention of travelling abroad then you should get down on your knees and praise whoever it was that taught you English in the first place.
I'm now on the flight back to dear old blighty and instead of banging on about the actual sights and sounds and activities that I did while in Athens I thought I'd share a fairly big thought I'd had while over there.
Yes, I went to the Acropolis. I saw the Parthenon. I stood on top of a mountain in the middle of one of the most ancient cities in the world and looked at a structure that has stood for thousands of years, not withstanding the efforts of the Persians, Germans and Lord Elgin. You know what I can tell you about it?
Not a damn thing.
Not a damn thing that's not in any of the books or guides. It's big, it's impressive and it's old. Go there, you might learn something, even if it's only how short your life is in respect to the history that's all around you.
I'm not degrading it, it's a cool place to be, but I can't tell you something that's not apparent from a bazillion other sources and told just as well. So my point isn't about the wonderful things I saw, but a realisation I had while over here, and it's about England, the English and our language.
We English were and still are great capitalists. Oh, the Americans have since overtaken us by far in the attention seeking and headline grabbing stakes, but the English were there earlier and by god did we do it well.
It was said (and I know it's an old line) that the sun never set on the British Empire, [because god doesn't trust an Englishman in the dark]. That's because we owned everything all the way around the world. Our trading companies looked at the efforts of Hannibal, Genghiz Khan and Alexander and laughed at their lack of ambition.
The Dutch and the French might claim to have owned some of it, but that was just the bits we let them have to keep them quiet once we'd done with them, like the schoolyard bully allowing the weedy kid to keep his milk basically cos he wanted the fizzy drink instead.
Where was I? Oh yes.
The world map was pink, and what wasn't pink was blue and even that had little lines all over it where we went.
No, it wasn't always pleasant, and sometimes the locals objected to us turning up with a flag, but you show me a country without a bloody history and I'll tell you to read a more honest history book.
Point being that the English conquered the world. Bit by bit we gave most of it back, the world having applied to the bully's mum with a petition, but most of it went back to the people who, you know, lived there first.
We did leave a legacy though, and that was a knowledge of English, the people as well as the language. Some, like Ibiza and Ayia Napa (however it's spelled) opened their doors and put out the welcome mat. Others, like the French for example, sneered and decided that we were just too common to be treated politely from then on.
But everybody knew the English language and kept hold of it because it was just a little bit useful to know. Right now, English is the most widely spoken language in the world and no matter what language is your first language you'll do better around the world than with anything else you know.
(Granted, more actual people speak Chinese, but most of them are in China so we won't mention that anymore. Due respect to them though, they know when they're onto a good thing.)
You're now probably getting around to calling me a white-van-driving, opinionated, xenophobic wanker. And with the exception of the van you're not far off, though I do add in a few contingencies.
If you're going to move to a different country, learn the damn language, otherwise it's just rude. I'm not just talking about the insular ethnic communities of immigrants in the UK where the elder members of the family just don't want to or see the need to adjust, but more particularly about the communities of ex-pats around the world (most notably spain) who move out to the sunshine and wouldn't dream of learning Spanish.
Who in god's name thinks that's acceptable?
Oh yes, them.
Back to my point, and it comes from having seen a few countries around Europe. I didn't do very much with languages at school, I got a B in GSCE French, a C in Latin and that was it. Since then I've travelled to the Canary Islands [Spanish], Paris [French], Austria [German], USA [English-ish*] Amsterdam [Dutch], Belgium [French again], Bukkoy [Norwegian], Cyprus [Greek], and now of course Athens [Greek].
[* While in the USA, a fifteen year old boy asked me if I spoke English where I came from. I asked him if he knew I came from England. He replied in the affirmative and reiterated his question. I had no clue as to what to answer him.]
I try and learn some before I go, and maybe pick up a bit while I'm there but to learn the language fluently before I go for essentially a few days would be bananas. I speak English while I'm over there because that's what they all know. And when they don't there will always be someone nearby who can.
It's not outrageous or disgraceful and it is something that should make you damn well proud. This little isle of ours has still conquered the world with nothing more than a Gideon's bible and the collected works of Shakespeare.
In case you're wondering what the term is for a common language that everybody can speak to each other in, the answer is Lingua Franca.
Which is Latin.
Saturday 27th June
Today I have done absolutely nothing.
I had a nice lunch of sausage, chicken and salad, and later i'll be going down to the beach for a nice supper with a few people.
Bugger you, I'm on holiday.
Friday 26th June
I love travelling the world, you meet some wonderfully interesting people. Some kind, some nice, some horrible bastards, some just completely bonkers. Here's just a sample of some of them that I've met while over here so far.
TOM
Take a look in any of the Athens guidebooks and you'll find tucked away, probably in the weird and woolly section, Tom's Recycled Garden. See, Tom left Belfast seventeen years ago when everyone he knew was blown to pieces by terrorists and he landed in Athens. Since then he's commandeered a corner lot in the middle of the Plaka, which is just below the Acropolis, and made it his own. The way he's made it his own is by taking all the old crap that the Athenians throw away and making useful and interesting and decorative things out of it.
And the Athenians throw away a lot of crap.
Over time this has developed into a corner lot that's not just a run down lot, but a decorative work of art, like a sculpture park in miniature and hidden away in the middle of the city. The guidebooks get told of this place and so write glowing tributes and tell you to go see it.
Which we did.
Now Tom's a lovely bloke. But he didn't really ask for this, he just makes stuff and currently he's having a bit of a clear out and his recycled garden is not fit for visiting, as he phrases it.
Which means that if you go and want to have a look, you're essentially going to his house and demanding to be shown… stuff.
He's a lovely man, he chatted to us in his yard for about ten minutes and was a little disappointed and frustrated to not be able to show us his garden. He demanded to show us his home, which is one tiny bedroom where he and his two dogs live (he sleeps on a mattress on top of the wardrobe, the dogs have commandeered the bed) and even offered to show us his kitchen/bathroom which he's built upstairs.
You can feel a little guilty about disturbing an artist at home when he's got nothing to show you. That's something the guidebooks don't tell you.
He really is a nice guy though, if a bit of a looney. But that's what Britain exports best.
THE PINK MAN
If you're ever wandering around a museum, look out for a guy in a pink shirt, especially if you have a camera handy. He'll follow you round and try and insinuate himself into each and every single one of your photos. I think he really liked me.
Oh, and if you hear about a body being found in a cupboard of the brand new acropolis museum, then it was nothing to do with me.
Nothing whatsoever.
LIVING STATUES
I always thought that the job of a living statue was to, you know, not move. I thought it was in the contract or something. My previous experience of such things led me to believe such a thing anyway. So it came as a learning experience that all you need to qualify as a living statue in Athens all you need is a couple of bedsheets and some white face paint. Oh, and a plastic cup.
Picture yourself sitting enjoying a pleasant meal with friends when suddenly you're honked at from behind.
This is not a sexual metaphor.
Turning around, you find yourself face to face with a guy wearing a floor length robe, a headscarf and with a badly applied white face. Oh, and a honking device, let's not forget the honking device. What in god's name is supposed to pass through your mind at this point?
An escapee from an insane asylum is one possible thought, as is some theatre show that he/she/it might be advertising. If, at any point a smiling man in white pushing a small plastic cup into your face illicits the thought of "Ah, a charming street performer, what a wonderful act! I must now reward this cheeky young urchin with money!" then there is something seriously wrong with you.
Oh, and if you hear about a body being found under a table in a street café in Athens with a honker pushed down his throat, then it was nothing to do with me.
He was still walking when I left the place.
MAURITZ CORNELIS ESCHER
Alright, he's dead already. I'll give you that one, I didn't actually meet him. But there is a little museum/gallery tucked away on the outskirts of Athens that's dedicated to the man. The graphic artist from the Netherlands has got a place dedicated to him in Greece, a country that I have found no record of him actually visiting.
But it's absolutely fascinating.
Personally, I'm not a big fan of museums or galleries. I just womble through sometimes quite quickly and if something catches my eye, I'll delay for a few seconds. Not this time. I sat and I studied and I watched and I read everything there. They have so much stuff of his and about him they've got a rolling showcase of things that they have to cycle though in seasons just to display it all. I could have gone back time after time.
I love his artwork, but this is the first time that I've actually learned something about the man, and his life is really interesting, and as a difference to all the other artists that you'll have read about and visited, his life wasn't tortured or broken or subject to insanity at all costs.
Sure, he was driven, but he was a genius, aren't we all a little strange?
GEORGE
My favourite meeting of today was George.
This is him.
He lives in the Ancient Agora, which is really easy to overlook, but huge and fascinating pretty much because it's full of a ruined city to look at and uncluttered with signs everywhere or tourists. He in fact lives in the shadow of the Temple of Hephaestus.
The Temple of Hephaestus is huge, magnificent, glorious and lots of other big words that mean impressive. It's like a half/quarter scale replica of the Parthenon, but it's all still there with walls and columns and things.
And when you see it you'll notice everybody around ignoring the building so they can take photos of the tortoise on the lawn. There's even a little man to make sure he's not too disturbed by people.
This is the first tortoise I have ever met with a bodyguard. That's even before anyone said that there's good eating on one of those.
You have to pity a god who's everlasting structure is overawed by a mere tortoise.
I call him George, and he's my hero.
Thursday 25th June
Nobody gives a toss.
I'm here in Athens and literally nobody gives a toss.
Nobody gives a toss about health and safety around here. I suppose there's less wasted money on making jobs for people to put warning labels on rocks saying DANGER : MAY CONTAIN ROCK, but they really don't care much around here, and I approve. I'm all for the population control of taking the warning labels off everything and let the world sort itself out.
Let's start with driving. Traffic lights are the one rule of the road that seems to work, people stop for those. However, do you know what side of the road you're supposed to drive on? Because from what I've seen, the Greek don't seem to be sure themselves. One way streets are only driven down one way at a time and parking consists of finding a car sized hole and leaving your car in it, even if it blocks the road for other road users.
Motorbikes and mopeds are absolutely everywhere, and they get around the traffic easily enough because when the road is blocked, the pavement is still available. Helmets ARE mandatory by law, and about one in five people have them. Out of those, around one in three has them on their heads, the rest settle for the helmet dangling from their elbow as they ride along. This is perfectly legal. Of course, the taxi ride last night was a fun experience, it's been absolutely ages since I played Grand Theft Auto.
Nobody gives a toss about the dead dogs everywhere. I mean everywhere. You're never more than 20 meters from an immobile dog. You might think they're sleeping, napping, resting or just absorbing the heat but to all intents and purposes they are dead to the world. I've seen them in the middle of the street having a kip with people walking all around and sometimes over them.
Nobody gives a toss about the potholes in the street. You know the big concrete blocks with little glass squares in them that are probably cellar skylights of some variety? I've seen about 50 of them as I walked around, not a single one with all the glass intact, some not even with the concrete in place. Pavements are wobbly and full of holes and there's gaps all over the place. It's not city wide, and it's not a huge problem, but after I nearly killed myself for the third time I was ready to start shoving people into them in front of me. Then again, I am a people person.
Nobody gives a toss about money. Everything you need is a fiver. Food, beer, coffee, sandwiches, all the essentials of life, a fiver. Unless you're in a posh place in which case food is multiples of a fiver. But everything else is cheap as dirt. Cigarettes, and you'd better be used to the smoking because there's always an ash tray nearby, are dirt cheap. The aforementioned taxi service was barely a couple of Euros for a ride after midnight for three of us which would have been upwards of twenty quid at home.
The attractions, all museums of one kind or another, are great value for money. Amsterdam, the city of sin, the cultural things to do gouged money out of your wallet hand over fist. Here in Athens, the city of thousands of years of history barely make a dent in the wallet. Though it did help that in my wallet I still had an old student card from when I took a night-school course in Photoshop last September. So everything archaeological in the city is free.
(The Americans behind me in the queue got very perky at this idea until they found out that it was only for EU students. Tameside College apparently counts as a European centre of learning. Who knew?)
Nobody gives a toss about anything with the possible exception of Gladys on the tram. It was wonderful to see even in such a sunny, happy, proud, ancient, intelligent and interesting city there is still the local equivalent of the decrepit old folk who's best excuse for being rude to everyone and everything was I'M OLD. Makes you proud.
Oh, they do give a toss about the marbles though.
They want them back.
Wednesday 24th June
Bollocks to skyphones, I've now got my entire office in the sky.
Except for a phone and secretary and coffee machine and such, but you get the point.
This might not seem like a big thing to you but I'm literally writing this from 50,000 feet high over mainland Europe. Actually, that's just a basic guess since I'm not looking at the altimeter and all I can see out from the windows is an endless expanse of white, which I'm presuming is clouds. For all I know we could be circling Lapland, but since the captain hasn't been on the intercom to tell us anything unusual, I'm assuming that we're still heading for Greece.
I love my little laptop.
Though it's not overly great right now since I'm 6'5" tall and I'm squidged into one of the sardine seats on this flight, which means that the space I have in front of me is about 13 cm. and that's including legroom. Which means that the laptop on my lap, (the one with the big screen) is folded over so I can barely see what I'm typing. I hope it's English. I might have to do some editing later.
So, anyway, I'm on a flight. My feelings about flying are definitely mixed. When I was fourteen I joined the RAF cadets simply because it was something to do and might be all manly and shit. I could have joined the army cadets but that seemed to involve something called yomping and I wasn't overly sure I would be down with that. Pretty much because I was a pasty unmuscled geek who spent most of his life hiding indoors playing video games.
Did I say 'was'?
Point being that as an RAF cadet I would get to learn all about planes and military life and all manly stuff like that. So obviously the first thing we did was learn how to march in strict timing and formation on the quad after school because marching up and down for hour after hour is good training for doing barrel rolls.
Yes, we had a quad. I went to a grammar school until they kicked me out. Let's not talk about it.
There were fun things to do in the cadets, but mainly I remember marching and more marching. In case you're wondering, marching in formation is a great big pile of steaming willies.
Just in case you're wondering.
Although marching was my over-riding memory, we also managed to do some fun stuff in the cadets. Every couple of months we got time in the rifle range where we had a few shots at tiny paper targets with a .22 rifle. I might not be able to kill a man outright from a thousand yards, but a paper target at fifty feet is no match for my marksmanship, I can tell you.
And flying. We did flying two or three times a year. We would have a couple of days out to a nearby base for a quick up and down, but once a year we would be stationed in an actual barracks on an actual RAF base for a full week for an actual real taste of life in the armed services. By which I mean 8 hours hard slog, 8 hours doing absolutely bugger all and then spending all your money in the NAAFI.
It's where I learned to fly, and I have to tell you it's a fucking excellent thing to do. I might only have had my hands on a little chipmunk and other diddy planes, but they did give us lessons on fighter control, airliner control and even how to handle a helicopter. You might think that's nothing but I'd rather take those lessons than a go on Microsoft flight simulator, thank you.
I also learned how a big metal tube actually manages to achieve flight, and with ten minutes and a whiteboard and a balloon I can show you in such a way as you understand as well. It's really that simple.
Where was I? Oh yes, on a flight, now somewhere over France I would imagine. I can see fields and things. I miss those planes with the little screen that shows your progress so far. Anyway, mixed feelings about flying.
See, if I'm in the cockpit with the stick in my hands and the instruments under my control then I'm fine, nothing can go wrong. You might be in the back freaking out at the thought of me at the controls, but that will be, let's face it, your problem and not mine so who gives a rat's arse?
It's only when I'm stuck in the back and can't see out of the front that I have a couple of issues. Now I'm a passenger with all of the inherent passenger worries. Like how much has the pilot been drinking, is it too much? Is it not enough? I know it's barely 8am and we've been in the air for an hour already, but you never know.
How about if Dawson's Creek or William Shatner is on the plane? I've seen those episodes of Family Guy and the Twilight Zone, I know the dangers.
Ok, you want me to be real for a minute, I'll give you something to think about next time you feel like freaking out on a commercial jet headed for the sky.
You are in a big metal tube on wheels about to head for the sky. Atomic batteries to power, turbines to speed and bat-propeller turning. You're shooting down the runway at five billion miles per hour.
Stay with me here.
The wheels are in the middle of the plane, just about. When the pilot pulls back on the stick to climb off the runway, the nose rises. This isn't just speculation, I know people who say they've seen it happen.
So if the nose rises then the tail has to drop, it's a matter of balance and counterbalance. The plane doesn't just jump into the air and rocket away (though that would be cool), it's first got to point into the sky while going really fast. So if the tail drops, who the hell is looking after not dragging the arse of the plane on the runway? It's not like the pilot has time to check the rear view mirror, though it would also be cool if he had a stick for mirror, signal, jump into the motherfucking sky.
Alright, another thought for you, how many parachutes do you think these budget airliners carry nowadays? I'll give you a clue, it's somewhere between zero and a million. I'll let you guess which end of that scale it's nearer to.
Finally, because I do have one last thought that you probably didn't know that comes with the basics of air flight. Do you know what a stall angle is? You know how a right angle is 90 degrees, yes? If you didn't know that then you're going to have to trust me.
Well when I was at flight school there was a little physical law (and I promise I'm not pissing around) that says that an airplane climbing at a high enough angle, the engines will stall and you turn from a jet liner back into an unpowered metal lump with fins.
You want to know what angle that is? Take a guess. I dare you. Between 0 and 90 degrees. Close your eyes now and just take a random stab in the dark. You got one? Sure about that? Absolutely sure? Final answer?
It's fifteen degrees. I shit you not. That's what I was taught and I have had no reason to contradict that pesky thing known only as science.
So next time you're on takeoff you take a look at how steep you think you're climbing as you jump off the runway and fly over your home city, and ask the guy sat next to you what angle he thinks you're rising at. It's a fun game.
I'll sign off now and enjoy the rest of the flight making strange popping sounds and occasionally farting toxic gasses. My little revenge on these irritating bastards who thought they could sit near me. That'll learn them.
Must be getting near to Greece now, just passed a big statue of Jesus on a mountaintop.
Monday 22nd June
I have a new game that I'm playing, and it's fun for all the family.
It's called 'Jobsworth'.
I'm doing quite well so far, I'm really proud.
The rules are very simple, and all you need to play is a car and a reason to visit the Manchester Royal Infirmary. For my character creation I chose an incurable digestive disorder disease which gives me +6 dieting but +4 toxic gasses. Swings and roundabouts, you know.
Anyway, the board is set up like this.
First you put up your hospital, then add a multi-storey car park a quarter mile away populated by wardens, or as we shall call them from now on, Jobsworths. Then every player takes a car token of their choice and a timer.
The game goes like this. The car park has different rates depending on how long you stay there, namely how long you're visiting the hospital.
Below half an hour, it's free. Half an hour to 3 hours, it's two whole pounds. 3 hours to 6 hours, it's four pounds. And so on.
Once upon a time in letters to the clients (the hospital doesn't use such crass terms as 'patient') there was a note indicating that appointments over three hours long would be eligible for a reduced parking rate in the car park. The aim of this game is to get the reduced parking rate.
My new medication treatment will NEVER be shorter than three hours long, so this interests me. My new game is to attempt to get the reduced parking rate.
Now before I start, have a guess at how easy this is.
Level 0 - Many many years ago
"Hello, my car is in there and I have had a camera rammed up my bumhole for the past 4 hours"
"Oh really? That doesn't sound too pleasant."
"You're absolutely right. It really, really isn't"
"Well, is there anything I can do to help, sir?"
"You could release my car, at a reduced cost, because as I say I have been over 3 hours"
"Absolutely sir, if you'll just give me your card … and there you go"
"An absolute pleasure doing business with you sir"
"And to you too, sir, and a jolly pleasant day."
Then they brought in the new edition rules, which just sent everything straight to hell. Now we have the arcane trickery used to make sure that there will never be any way of getting the reduced rate. And it forms a step by step plan, or as I like to call it, making shit up to make the customer go away.
Now picture each of these responses comes a couple of months after the previous one. I've been playing this game for a while now.
Level 1 - I don't speak English.
Fairly self explanatory this one. First you block the entrance with your mate's little punto full of imbeciles as you clock on for your shift, then you shout loudly about football to your 'colleagues' who I hope despise you as much as I do, before finally ignoring customers and barely mumbling the words "don't speak english". Well done you. Prick.
Level 2 - You need proof
"I'm sorry mate, but you need some sort of proof that you were in the hospital. No, the idiot band on your wrist doesn't count, anyone could get one of those. Come back when you've got a bit of paper."
Level 3 - You need better proof
"No, you see, this letter only tells me when your appointment was. You could have been out of that in ten minutes and gone shopping in town until now. What you need is a letter written by someone in the ward you were at saying you've been there until now."
Level 4 - You want me to write a letter?
"Nope, never heard of writing a letter to the car parking people. If I did that I'd be writing silly letters all day. I don't have time for such stupidity."
Level 5 - Ah, just what I asked for, but….
"Good morning. Yes, that is indeed a signed letter from the ward. And indeed it mentions you by name, and is signed by the nurse. Only problem is that it isn't stamped. Obviously it needs to be stamped otherwise how could we tell where it came from? No, the letterhead doesn't help us, and obviously I'm not going to call the ward, that would be too easy. You need to get yourself a stamp on the letter."
That's where I'm upto right now.
It's a choice of either laugh or cry. Probably both. I get the distinct impression that they don't get asked very often and don't know how to deal with it. I also think they'll do anything to mess with people, which is obviously something you should look for when hiring auxiliary hospital staff.
Let's see what happens when I go back next time with a signed, stamped and dated piece of paper. Probably turn me away because it wasn't signed by the hospital governor and the pope. Or it wasn't written left handed.
Best suggestions as to why we don't want to help you this week win a prize.
Answers on a postcard to the usual address.
Wednesday 17th June
No, this isn't me coming back, this is me shouting from the toilet.
Basically cos in my weakened state my brain said something i wanted to share.
Imagine the hounds of tinderloss and baskerville, cerberus, gnasher and the thing all had been released from hell at the same time through a mystical portal that was slightly too small to allow all of them through at the same time, so they're fighting like billy-o as they struggle through scratching and biting as they go.
So now imagine that portal has it's earthly manifestation in my belly.
And the only thing standing between the hounds and unholy devastation across the plains of earth is my gall bladder.
That's what this feels like. And it sucks.
But i bet you're happy you know what a gall bladder is for, aren't you?
Tuesday 16th June
I'm sorry to have to say this, but i really can't think straight enough to post anything at the minute, I've been in absolute agony for the best part of two weeks now and my head isn't up to being very funny.
Next medication is on thursday, see how it goes from there, ok?
Thursday 11th June
This is what I would call a daisy cutter day.
Where I would be quite happy for a few hundred daisy cutters to be dropped on the city and wipe out everybody, with the exception of me, obviously.
It'd be even better if the bodies could be tidied out of the way afterwards of course, possibly by some sort of zombie cleaning lady. I wouldn't want the place to be left untidy after all.
It's not just that people irritate me, it's that they are also everywhere.
Just look at them. Put them in a car and they're a menace on wheels, without the car they're just ignorant squealing blobs that spew bile and intolerance wherever they go.
Because of them you won't be able to avoid football this summer, no matter what you watch or do.
Because of them you're paying car insurance twice what your car is worth.
Because of them the British National Party is speaking on your behalf in Europe.
Because of them Britain's Got Talent, Big Brother and all the rest will never stop.
Because of their second homes and buy-to-rent deals then real people can't buy their first homes, house prices skyrocket, banks over-lend, economies collapse and recession happens.
Because of their ignorance and lack of caring about the world, oil is meaningless and petrol prices jump again and again.
And that's why it's a daisy cutter day.
I've thought on occasion that I'd like to see a story about he last man on earth, and now I'll probably end up writing it myself.
I'm talking about really the last man. No zombies or vampires or infected. No survivors. Just literally one man left out of the entire human population.
Ignore how. Forget it, it's not important.
But how would the last man alive deal with it? How would he feed himself, clothe himself, move around? It's not like it's a desert island, there would be all these shops and buildings ripe for looting. Power and utilities would last for a while before giving out. TV might even show something on the occasional channel, though a looped 'Friends' channel might send anyone over the edge.
He would have to learn survival skills not seen before in conjunction, like lock-picking and generator maintenance. Stitching and motor repairs. Shooting would be a waste of time since there's nothing to come close to attacking him in the British Isles.
Would he be able to get over the crushing and overwhelming loneliness?
How quickly would it be before he hot-wired a car and ram-raided a shopping centre for supplies?
Think about it.
Imagine yourself as the only person on the planet next time you are out on the street.
Hold your breath and picture the universe without anyone else there to disturb the peace.
Savour it. Roll it around in your head and keep it safe for the next time you're bothered by people.
Take it out next time they put the flags on the cars and paint their faces.
Daisy Cutter Day.
Wednesday 10th June
I don't know if you've noticed it, but the internet is full of lies and unhelpful bollocks.
Who would have thought it?
Seriously, I went searching for some useful information at lunchtime on a subject you're never going to care about.
Within a few seconds I had been directed to 50,000 pages relevant to the subject. Even discounting the porn, I still had thirty-eight to choose from.
Of those thirty eight pages,
Fourteen were opinion pieces from people who had never tackled the subject, much less seen one in operation and so were so mis-informed and badly phrased that they might have been typed by a hedgehog with epilepsy for all the use they were.
Ten were reaction to the previous fourteen involving swearing, threats and many insults of a genital nature.
Seven were cunningly disguised pornography
Five were instructions on how to do something based on what I was looking for, but not actually what I was looking for and depended on the use of custard.
Two were picture galleries of collections of obscure cinematography from the 19th Century from all over the globe, including Balham. (Gateway to the North)
And One actually had the information I was looking for. (3' 7", in case you're interested).
That's the problem with the internet. They let just anybody on here.
Mind you, at least there's all that porn to make up for it, eh?
Tuesday 9th June
Here's a puzzle for you.
I heard it many years ago, and it took me long enough to work out. See how fast you can figure it out. I'm not taking any credit for it other than to pass it onto a new set of thinkers.
GOLDILOCKS AND THE THREE PAYING CUSTOMERS
Once upon a time there was a little cabin park in the woods, run by a little old lady and her granddaughter Goldilocks. They owned many cabins in the woods and rented them out nightly to paying guests.
One day, three bears came looking for a room, A Daddy Bear, A Mummy Bear and a Strange Uncle Bear called Frank. The three bears didn't have a lot of money between them, but they managed to pool the 30 gold pieces needed to pay for the room.
Just the one room.
Late that night, Goldilocks' grandmother felt sorry for them and decided to give them some money back. She sent Goldy with 5 gold pieces to the cabin of the three bears.
Goldy, being a spoiled little madam decided that since there were three of them, they could each have a gold piece back and she would pocket the other 2 'spare' gold pieces and nobody would ever know.
Which she did, the thieving little bitch.
Now, the bears had all now paid 9 gold pieces each. 3 x 9 = 27 gold pieces.
Goldilocks stole 2 gold pieces. 27 + 2 = 29 gold pieces.
But the bears paid 30 gold for the room…
Where is the last gold piece?
See if you can work it out. First correct answer gets the same rubbish prize as usual.
Friday 5th June
All right, so I lied to you.
It won't be the first time, certainly won't be the last.
But see, it was all worth it in the end, wasn't it?
OK. Let's start at the very beginning.
1990. Oldham. My parent's living room.
I was 14. I have no idea who or why or where we ended up with a copy of the Secret of Monkey Island. Probably my mother bought it. She had a passing interest in adventure games, I remember playing text based adventures like Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy and King's Quest and even the Collosal Cave Adventure. They were pretty good, but all of a sudden there was this… thing.
It had pirates, it was fun, I could figure out the puzzles and it was absolutely hilarious. You accidentally fell off a cliff to be presented with a GAME OVER screen, only for seconds later Guybrush Threepwood pops back on screen with a simple explanation of 'rubber tree' and you carry on with the game.
It might have been 16 colours but that was the top of the gaming ladder at that point. PAC-MAN could go suck himself and Q-Bert? Don't talk to me of him anymore. Even Chuckie Egg and Dizzy, the two gaming heroes in the universe of all creation to that point might as well go and bathe in acid for all I cared about them, I had Guybrush and his quest to become a pirate.
Yes, this probably had a lot to do with why I took up roleplaying games many years later.
Then the nightmare happened.
I completed it. Finshed. Finito. Done. Dead. No More. There were no such things as easter eggs at that time in video games. Well, there were, but we didn't know that. No, all we could do was start it up again and play all the way through exactly the same story. I don't know how many times I played through that thing but it was more than a couple. It was almost exactly like being addicted to smack. The first high is great, after that the rush gets shorter and shorter and though satisfying, it doesn't match up to the first hit.
So I needed a fresh hit of something new.
I remember going with my parents to the video game shop. Well, I say it was a video game shop, you wouldn't actually find someone stupid enough to think a shop selling ONLY video games and think they could make money. It was an IBM outlet branch in what is now the walkabout bar in Oldham. There you go, go in and reminisce about my childhood why don't you? Anyway, it was a computer shop with one shelf that had some games on it.
Hey, a shelf was an improvement. A couple of years previously they had a spindle-rack with a couple of tapes on it, and again we're talking Dizzy and Q-Bert and the like. And one day, in the dim and distant past, Monkey Island 2 : LeChuck's Revenge appeared on that shelf.
Except it didn't.
It was a poster. It told me that it was out in a month or two. I forget how long that period was because to me it was a lifetime. I didn't have normal things like hobbies or friends or an interest in the opposite sex. All I had was a month to go until the ultimate game in the history of creation was released.
You think the kids of today are annoying and angsty? You have no idea. That episode of South Park where Cartman freezes himself to skip the time before the Wii comes out? If I'd have thought of that in 1991 then I would so be flying around with Buck Rodgers today, I swear.
Anyway, That day.
1991. Oldham. That Shop.
The very first game, and one of the very few, that I have bought on the actual day of release. OK, again another lie, my mother paid for it, but I was there and I demanded it. Demanded it on pain of death.
Well, somebody was going to die. I might have been only 14 but I was still over six feet tall at the time and I think it was probably one of the many moments my mother saw my future career paths being either Geek or Serial Killer.
The jury's still out on that one.
Anyway, she bought the game. We went home, and there in the corner of the living room was the magic box that would consume my life from that point on. Halfway through the installation process everything goes to hell. Windows probably got smashed, I don't remember.
It wouldn't work. You know that little panel on the side of the box that indicated minimum system requirements for a game to play? Well, we didn't check that beforehand.
Graphics? Check. We had VGA by this time. That was ok.
Sound? Check. We had Adlib. Whatever that was.
Mouse? Check. We had all the new technology.
Hard Drive Space? Ah. 11Mb. WHAT THE FRIGGING SOUL OF CHRISTENDOM?
Eleven Megabytes? For ONE game? You have to be kidding me! The entire hard drive was only 40Mb in total, and it had Windows 3.0 on it. That only took 8Mb as it was. My god, a game that took more memory than the operating system on the machine?
You laugh now, but how would you feel if you bought World of Warcraft and before you could play it, you had to delete all of the porn you had stored on your machine? You'd have a fit and have to be hospitalised before even thinking about making a decision.
An hour later and we had trimmed everything down to the bare minimum of what was on the hard drive and had deleted everything that wasn't literally vital to the continuation of mankind. It was like the Starship Enterprise choosing between life support or… well porn springs to mind again, but let's go with lights.
The game installed. I could play the game I had been waiting for.
Heavenly choirs sang. The police were stepped down from being on red alert.
Eventually, after time, I completed it. From that point on, I was hooked. Every point and click adventure must be mine, especially those to come from the gaming goldmine of Lucasfilm studios. (LucasArts were a long way off yet).
Day of the Tentacle, Simon the Sorcerer, Loom, Sam and Max hit the Road, Gabriel Knight, anything and everything. There was even one that came close to being as good as Monkey Island, Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders.
But still I waited for the next Monkey Island.
Eventually I moved on to other things, most notably console games and that's a story for another time, but still a little bit of my heart belonged to Ron Gilbert and his masterpiece.
I tried Escape from Monkey Island and The Curse of Monkey Island when they came out, neither of which hit the same buzz. Then we get to Wednesday.
2009. Inside the Interwebs.
Wednesday, the Delphic oracle, she that must be argued with, tells me that the original Secret of Monkey Island is being released on Xbox live arcade. The sleeping choirs of angels perk their ears up and awake sleepily from their comas.
I must search more to find out if this is true.
It is. It was announced at E3 just days before, BUT, even better is the news that there is new Monkey Island. Chapter 5 is to be released just 3 days before my birthday.
Hint.
So I need to tell the world. Or at least the little piece of it that reads VagueNet. So I start writing, and all of a sudden it hits me.
What if this game is a hideous crock of shit? What if I've built up in my head something that will give corpses crashing orgasms? Even with the input of Ron Gilbert, (a man who by rights made me his bitch when I was still a minor) it might not be the greatest thing ever.
Hmm.
Well how crap could it be?
I mean it's not like it's going to be a kart racer, or a beat-em-up or a first person shooter or any of that rubbish. I mean, it would be inconceivable for someone to take such a valued piece of my childhood and bumrape it in such a fashion.
So, OK, I lied to you.
But it could be worse. Be thankful, there's a new Monkey Island on the horizon.
Actually, while writing it, and aiming for just the right level of believable bullshit in those games, with in-jokes and references, I was actually thinking that I would play these games.
Hey, I love Monkey Island, what more can I say?
Thursday 4th June
It's been nearly twenty years since I first played Monkey Island, and it still ranks as the greatest games series ever created. Finally they've done it, announced this week at E3, it's finally coming back!
I could Squee and mess my own trousers with joy!
Best part is? It's not even one game! It's three!
Directly quoted from the website….
Monkey Island Racing-Kart, Island Nutters!
Stan, the world's greatest second hand salesman has moved on from selling ships, insurance and coffins! Now he's selling Carts! Coconut-fuelled carts loving crafted by Lemonhead himself! Play as Guybrush, LeChuck, Murray, Elaine, Governor Marley, Herman Toothrot or The Voodoo Lady! Race around the docks on Booty Island! Scream around the Dead-man's bend on Knuttin Atoll! And loop de loop through the giant monkey's head on Monkey Island™ itself!
Monkey Island Lubber's Fairground!
Join little Guybrush and his brother Chuckie round the Big Whoop Amusement Park in a series of mini-games to see who can find the secret treasure of Monkey Island™! Try your swordfighting skills against Carla, The Sword Master of Melee Island™! Quake in fear as you encounter the beast even Meathook is terrified of! Death-slide your way to victory with your very own rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle!
D.O.M.I.N.A.T.I.O.N. - (Destruction-On-Monkey-Island-And-Totally-Insane-Obliteration-Nastiness!)
The enemy is at the gates! You've fought Zombies before, you've fought Pirates before, but never before in the realms of first person shooters have you had the chance to take on Zombie Pirates! Grab your handy cutlass and your voodoo grog shooter and head on out to take down those scurvy swabs! Featuring nearly nine levels of intense Piratical action climaxing with an all-cannons blazing finale against The Dreaded Zombie Ghost Pirate LeChuck himself, even Murray would fear for his life!
Pre-Order now and get the special edition pack including a limited edition rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle to call your very own!
I don't know about you, but I am so getting one of those. You wanna join me?
It's all right here.
Wednesday 3rd June
I have a new hero.
You must bow down before the levels of bravery this man has gone under.
No, bravery is the wrong word. Epic Balls of Titanium, there, that's the right way of putting it.
For over 20 years he was kept in seclusion, fed little, denied even the most basic of necessities like football or television.
I know, half torture, half pleasure.
Until he escaped.
Well, I say escaped. More sort of … walked away. After over 20 years of deprivation he got up and walked out.
He's now 24.
Ok, let's take it back to the beginning. Buddhist Lama tradition states that death is merely a doorway and a Lama will be reincarnated. Lama Yeshe died, they found the chosen child and took him into the monastery and worshipped and trained him to be Lama Tenzin Osel Rinpoche.
Until the day that Lama Tenzin Osel Rinpoche looked around the monastery and thought "Bollocks to this" and walked out to become just plain old Osel Hita Torres again.
They are keeping his cell warm in anticipation of him coming back though.
He's now a student in Madrid. You know what he's studying?
Film.
Which is extra levels of awesome because in the entirety of his life in the monastery he has seen zero TV. Zero music. And only one film. A specially sanctioned film which they felt would be educational. I would lay money you wouldn't guess which film they chose.
The Golden Child.
Yup. An Eddie Murphy action / comedy about a child Lama kidnapped by Satan (as played by Charles Dance, the most awesome of bad guys) was used as an educational film for the developing Guru.
This WAS educational. Not about how you can live in a small cage for three months eating only leaves. Not even about how you can make a tasty porridge using hooker's blood.
No, It taught young Lama Rinpoche that this Lama shit is dangerous and movies are fricking awesome. Especially movies with James Hong and Charles Dance.
Chosen reborn avatar of a worldwide religion? No thanks. I'm going to Hollywood.
Tell me that doesn't take balls.
Huge mighty reincarnated balls.
Tuesday 2nd June
I'm disgusted with you.
Really, I am.
I've gone past dissapointed now, I'm just disgusted with the lot of you.
See, I got an e-mail this morning from facebook telling me that my friends had declared I had a crap taste in music.
Cowards.
You can't even tell me face to face, you have to hide behind facebook to tell me that you have no opinion other than that which you grifted from your other bleating sheep-like friends and ShitPop FM.
Are your feelings hurt? Is it because I say nasty things about the amorphous interchangeable blobs that are constantly shat out by Pop-Idol and BGT? Is it because I've declared that any group without an instrument have no right to call themselves a band? Is it because of your rampant desire to be Kanye West, Lilly Allen, Amy Winehouse or Gareth Gates or any of a million plastic moulded dolls that bleat the same tired crap year after year?
Well Fuck You.
I have some standards. I demand a musician to be able to at least recognise a guitar. It would be nice if they sang their own music that they wrote but I don't insist upon it. Most of all I demand that they have absolutely nothing to do with Simon fucking Cowell.
Oh yes, and you know the song Hallelujah? The one that was Christmas #1 and #2? The one that's just been on 3 films this year including [I'm ashamed to say] Watchmen? Yeah, Simon Cowell owns that song, he earns money every time it's played. And it's every fucking where. That's how much he hates you, and would gladly defecate on your ancestors bones before violating them with glee if there was money involved in it. He doesn't care about you and he doesn't care about music. He cares about money, namely selling shit to you and you lap it up "because he's so nasty and that's funny".
So don't you dare judge me on my choices.
And those of you that don't fall into that pit of hate, fuck you too. Stand up for real music every now and then and be counted. Then you can think about judging me.
And you'll still be wrong.
On a lighter note, the quiz from the previous week was the opening lines to some good songs. In fact, some of them are frigging amazing songs, especially #10. If you've not heard them, go do so now.
God that felt good.
Monday 01st June
Well, it's June already.
Only another 17 weeks before I wallow amongst the ranks of the unloved, ungodly and unemployed.
I can't wait, simply for the reason that nine billion idiots decided to go to work this morning just so they could get in my way. Obviously I've been spoiled this past couple of weeks with the ability to put my foot on the accelerator and be able to move forwards.
Again, the commute that should take under an hour now takes twice that.
The feeling of murder is mitigated slightly by the fact that the day is lovely and somewhere out there the air might be breathable away from the motorway.
Bring on the day when a sunny morning means sitting in the garden instead of the sofa or my work-desk.
Bring on the day when the radio traffic report means as little to me as the shipping forecast.
Bring on the day when I can wear a basque, clown wig and flip-flops to work and nobody cares, except maybe the postman.
Maybe I shouldn't have admitted to that.
My only worry is the ability to make it pay.
That requires working. And writing. And selling.
Bugger, I knew there was a drawback somewhere.
I'll definitely be pondering that as I eat toast at my desk with my cat and a bottle of vodka as my work colleagues.
Oh yes, the angst.
Thursday 28th May
17 monkeys in a barrel
Which one gets out first?
Answers on a postcard
Wednesday 27th May
A penguin and a box of nails and a rubber chicken, doing something.
You should never on the spur of the moment ask a friend for a subject to be funny about. It's like going to an improvisational comedy club and shouting out 'The Maastricht Treaty of 1856' and expecting belly laughs. Not going to happen.
A penguin and a box of nails and a rubber chicken, doing something.
Thanks.
So the penguin is the only alive being there, and it's not exactly sentient. Is the penguin doing something to the rubber chicken? Is it sexual? If so, what's going on with the box of nails?
Does the box of nails feel left out with not being involved in the possibly sexual conduct of a penguin with the aforementioned rubber chicken? Will the box of nails feel depressed and try to commit suicide by jumping off a bridge only to discover Zen Buddhism and end up taking a spirit walk across the plains of Kenya with a mug of cocoa for company, which incidentally the box of nails calls Geoff?
No. It's a box of nails. It just sits there.
In fact, the rubber chicken doesn't have a lot of a say in what's going on itself. It could be getting violated by the penguin using the nails from the box and still it wouldn't complain because, and I've said it before… it's just a rubber chicken.
So in fact whatever it is that's going on is pretty much up to the penguin and the penguin alone. It's not likely that the box of nails is going to have exciting suggestions for things to do or day trips out printed on the side, no, that's usually the purview of a box of matches and nails are quite susceptible to charges of demarcation.
So what would a lonely and bored penguin eventually do if presented with a rubber chicken and a box of nails? Obviously contemplating the universe is out of the question, since the primary consideration is that they are doing 'something'.
I'm not overly of the opinion that they'd visit a pub since penguins are not known for their alcohol consumption, rubber chickens aren't brave enough and the box of nails wouldn't want to meet a pisshead who thought he was harder and have to then be taken down a peg or two.
No, this penguin, this mighty penguin of taste and fortitude would take the only sane path when presented with a box of nails and a rubber chicken. He would find something to nail the chicken's head to.
Unfortunately the hammer and the wall were not part of the original parameters of the joke and so lost in a strange calm world of ultimately nothing, the penguin waddles, hour after hour, day after day, searching, with a box of nails under one flipper and a rubber chicken under the other.
It's like some strange Belgian cartoon you find at 2am.
Tuesday 26th May
!! * Congratulations * !!
You have completed mission : [Packet & frozen food cooked without reading instructions]
You have completed optional side quest : [Avoid Food Poisoning]
You have achieved COOKING : Level 2!
Your reward is...
Burger and Rice
You may now eat.
(I'm still terrified the hot box will become self aware and kill me)
Friday 22nd May
Winner gets to pick something for me to be angry at next week.
I know, we have huge prizes here...
Thursday 21st May
That is, I swear, the last tim i travel to Narnia.
Not only have they never heard of Wi-Fi, they don't even have any waterslides
Plus, Mrs Beaver was not all she cracked up to be.
Monday 18th May
I find it difficult to write.
I need a lack of distraction. I need somebody to blow facebook up. Or kill it when I'm working. I need a worldwide ban on online poker while I'm trying to work.
I think I should start a petition to remove all pornography from the internet, it's too distracting. I'm sure that would work, a petition.
I need for there not to be a huge pile of 360 games that's untouched since months before the nationals. Some of those are downright tempting to play.
Come on universe, can't you see that I need to get some writing done?
Though the kitchen does look good now that I've done all the washing up, cleaned the fridge, tidied the cupboard under the stairs, mopped the floor, tidied the recycling and fed the cats.
And the living room is looking a lot better now I've re-arranged the furniture, thrown out the rubbish, cleaned the surfaces and alphabetised the DVDs and games.
And I've finished Mirror's Edge and almost finished Stranglehold. And read that script again and done my e-mails.
Now. Chapter 1. Erm……
How can anybody work while their CDs aren't on the correct shelf?
It's insanity.
Friday 15th May
Something's been bugging me for a couple of weeks now.
You see, if you've been living in the UK or heard anything from the UK news then you know that there's been a big hoo-hah about the politician's expense accounts.
Apparently they've just found out that our politicians are corrupt.
Who'da thunk it?
Our Members of Parliament have been charging the loyal and honest (ish) taxpayers for such things as swimming pools, holidays, already-paid mortgages and even porn. That's right, if you get elected, you can claim your porn as a working expense.
Shit, I'd probably expense a research grant into winged monkeys.
But that's not what's been bothering me. I could suggest ways to fix it, never mind this Sign-In-Sod-Off scheme that Smiley Brown put out on YouTube. No, I'd beef up the accountants and give them the ability to tell the MPs to get stuffed when they put in a dumb expense.
No, that's not what's bothering me. See, we've been through the Labour party's records. Then we hit the Tory records. Then we hit the Alliance and Leicester party, and then we'll hit the independents. We know some of the worst nasty shit that they've been spending our money on.
Yes, I did use the word 'our'. I do pay my taxes, robbing bastards that they are.
What I'm wondering is what about the other end of the table. Who are they? Where are the people that spent a fiver on a sandwich and soup for lunch cos they were away from the office on a business trip and then felt guilt about claiming for it. Who're the people that paid for the Norwegian au-pair out of their own pocket because they needed someone to look after the kids?
Where are the honest politicians, or at least the closest that we have in this country? Where are the people that spend the public money in the public interest?
Bring them forward, let us see a shining example of an oxymoron, an honest politician. Then let US choose who we want to lead our country.
And who gets to research the winged monkeys.
Thursday 14th May
Hello.
This is the part where I'd describe what happens in a video game that many people found to be shit. I'd express my feelings and life as an inhabitant of that world drawing from it my feeling of immersion. I might then go on about the social and political structure of the world and make amusing commentary about things the designers might have missed or not cared about. See my review of Animal Crossing : Wild World or even Pokemon Diamond for example.
Not today.
Today I have to break that pattern because I have to talk about the game as a video game and I can't do that if I'm playing pretend that it's a real world and we all live in it. No, this time I have to talk about the game.
If you hadn't worked it out by now, what with the title up there being a big clue, the game I'm telling you about is Mirror's Edge.
See, the problem is that it is really immersive. It's a phenomenal game with an excellent and pretty city during broad daylight (how rare is that?) that's fun and functional and pretty and wonderful and free flowing and fast and funky. Until it breaks. Not the programming, no, it breaks you. I deliberately brings you into a world of joy and laughter and excitement and adrenaline… then slaps you in the face, points at you sat on the sofa and calls you a sad lonely wanker.
With no mates.
And bad hygiene.
Let me keep pushing my opinion onto you with a couple of carefully chosen examples.
You're running from the law at a sprint. Leaping from one tall building roof over a street onto the roof of a slightly lower building. You're not sure you will make the leap, (which can be difficult in 1st person view.) but you're in mid-air now and this is no time for second thoughts. There are two possibilities.
The comedy part is when you notice that it's the same button in both choices. So, do you hold the button risking a scary death plummet or do you not hold the button risking your shoulders meeting your shins in a fountain of lovely red?
If that's not enough to piss you off, and believe me, I've gone plummeting to my death more than a few times because of it, if that's not enough let me tell you about level one.
Level one is by far the pinnacle of the game so far. It has freedom and space and colour and challenge and gunmen shooting at you and everything. And as much as there is no in-game reason to be shot at, it works because it gives you no time to sit and think and plan, you have to run on instinct alone and that's the genius of this game because you can do that, it works for motivation alone and that's wonderful.
Then all of a sudden you're on level two and it's underground on a clear path from A to Z and you have to follow it like a dog following a zombiewagon. Freedom might as well take a holiday at this point because you rarely see it for the rest of the game.
Me? I'm stuck halfway through the game in a cupboard trying to do a pipe-climb, wallrun, twist, leap, grab, swing, flip combo. I've been trying it again and again for about 50 times so far. And unless I finish this cupboard, (that I had no choice to go round) then I can't see the rest of the game.
I like this game. I could have loved this game.
Providing it stopped telling me it was a video game and kicking me in the nuts.
Wednesday 13th May
You know weird shit can happen when you're trying to do good things.
I have 3 points of access to this website. One for the blogging, one for maintenance, one for other weird stuff.
Beleive it or not, i've been locked out of my own website for months and months due to having forgotten the keys. Or at least out of 2 of 3. The third one remembered my keys but wouldn't share them with me.
So i set out to get the keys back. Valiantly did i quest, maidens did fall by te wayside and dragons were slew by the hundred. The result was that i locked myself out of the 3rd point of access.
And the wise woman that lived in the boggy knoll couldn't understand e-mail long enough to bind me some new keys and get them to me.
10 months is too long to have restricted access to your own website
2 hours isn't that much to be cut out from it completely
Let's see what happens next
Monday 11th May
How do you people not know this?
How did this happen?
Where did the universe go wrong that such simple things are beyond your knowledge?
I'm not talking about in-jokes and private gags and bits that you'd only realistically know if you're in the centre of a private circle. I'm not talking about who killed M'shen or the origin of the dairy milk logo. I never once intimated that you should know who Guybrush Threepwood is or even what 'The Punisher' fears more than anything else….
I'm talking about the red shirt.
Worse, I'm watching "Star Trek : The Arguable Rebooting" and talking about the red shirt.
Worse than that, I'm giggling, pointing at the screen and saying "He's wearing a red shirt!"
… the correct answer is not "So?"
For the sake of the soul of James T Kirk, people, this is not hidden knowledge!
Go to Google, type in 'The Red Shirt'…. Out of 27.5 MILLION hits, this is number 1. People are aware of it.
It's been a running gag now for forty-three years, it's not new! Everybody's heard of it.
Well, I thought so.
I was at the cinema. I found somebody who had never heard of it. This boggled me. I shared this knowledge today with 6 other people. None of them had the faintest clue about what I was talking about.
This is scary.
This is like a universe where people wear little beards.
Friday 8th May
I have an irrational love.
Yesterday, while waddling out of the restaurant at lunchtime… damn that all you can eat buffet… I received a phone call.
It was from an old friend of mine who was in a pickle. He's putting on a show in less than two weeks and one of the cast just dropped out. Maybe swine flu, maybe lurgy, possibly dropped dead, all I know is he's down one actor and needs somebody now.
I said OK. It's a narration part and I can get away with having the script in my hand so it shouldn't be a problem, it gets him out of a bind and everybody's happy. It's not like I have the fear of talking in front of an audience anymore.
Last night I met up with him at the pub and he hands me the script. I won't go into details but it's not entirely to my tastes. Hell, I hardly ever have any say in the script that I read so that's not a problem, I now have a script to read and start learning before the next rehearsal which is tomorrow.
Bear with me, I'm getting on to the point shortly.
Now this script. It's about 20 pages long and the parts I have to read vary from long lecture pieces to Elizabethan poetry, with all the trimmings and all of them are monologues. Now I'm going to have a hard time learning any of the 14 sets that I have to do so I really am going to need a book in my hand on stage.
I have 20 pages of typed A4. Loose leaf. This is not a book, nor is it very comfortable to hold while stood and read out loud. Righty-ho, I can deal with this. First we get a photocopier and shrink the pages down to A5. Which it does automatically, 2 to a page. Measure carefully for the exact halfway point and chop with a guillotine.
Then I go find some card. Nice card. There is no dark card so I settle on some moderately stiff bright yellow sheet of A4, again measure and cut into 2 A5 pieces. Now over to the comb-binder, where you split it into managable chunks, punch it, then put it through the roller with the comb.
Ta-da! One hand-sized book which can be read on stage.
I love stationery. I love pens and papers and files, documents, rulers, boxes, storage and all sorts of things like that. And I most especially love machinery that plays with it. Copiers, printers, laminators are all special toys that I love and understand and are seemingly beyond the knowledge of the common man.
But todays toy is the comb binder. I want one. a lovely little toy which can turn a pile of papers into a book. How great is that? Who wouldn't want one? I can think of a million and one uses for it.
Ok, I can think of one use for it.
But isn't that use great? Who would be insane enough to not want to make books?
There. I've said it. I love things like this.
I'm even thinking about stealing the electronic label printer that is on my desk when I leave.
Which is in 21 weeks time....
Thursday 7th May
I needed a quiz. And after writing a complex set of 100 questions with themes, linkages, hints and extras then I wasn't in the mood to write another 20, even just for fun. So I shared my problems with the root of all knowledge, The Internet.
The internet was rubbish.
Though it did give me the idea for a game-related true or false quiz and two of the questions. So now it's time to give the answers to you.
Wednesday 6th May
Good afternoon,
I bet you're wondering why you're in hospital, aren't you? Well, what do you remember last?
Do you remember getting up this morning? How about getting dressed? Do you remember why you picked that outfit, because I'm fairly sure that combination is a sure case of brain injury as it is, never mind the rest of the day.
Where were we?
Oh yes. Do you remember coming to work? I won't ask if you remember doing work, I don't think they have finger-paints or sticklebricks in your office.
So you remember upto lunchtime. This is good. See, I can help from here.
What happened then is that you came into the shop, you know, the little shop with only one staff member and then you dragged her over to the hot counter to explain what everything was. And I mean everything.
You didn't believe her that those trangular things were samosas, you had to ask her again, And yes, that was a pie. That round thing was (surprisingly enough) a jacket potato, I know they're foreign and strange, but trust us, it's a jacket potato.
Those are pasties. Never heard of them? Oh well please feel free to distract the only staff in the shop explaining to you what is in each of them, just under the labels. Oh, you say there's potatoes and meat in a meat and potato pasty? That's a shock. No, I don't think it was a stupid question. I think you're stupid, but that's neither here nor there.
I also have no idea for your reasons why you're asking if that cheese pasty was halal. I'm fairly sure from the way you ask it that you don't know what halal means, but since I'm not entirely sure as to the slaughtering techniques in the procurement of cheese then I'll let it pass.
See, all of this took time, and there was quite a queue building up waiting for the one and only one serving staff to be able to get back to the till to serve. Which you thankfully eventually did. Everybody was watching you and your exceptionally large mouth as you started to tear up because the concept of a cheese and pastry lunch was too confusing on the unknown blood / cleanliness issue.
You nearly got a round of applause when you finally selected a sausage roll and joined the queue. See, the thing is, you joined the queue by walking up to the till and standing there. At the front. And you know that big guy stood right there waiting at the till?
Yes, that was me.
And then you turned around, realised your mistake and with a sickly smile you graciously offered to let me go in front of you, as if you were doing me a favour. Wasn't that sweet of you?
See, I can understand why this is where it might get a little hazy for you.
Now I don't often have a wooden spoon to hand, but for reasons I won't go into right now at lunchtime I did. And I was fair. Since I was first in the queue, I only slapped you in the face with it once.
The woman behind me? Well she was second so she got to slap you in the face twice with the spoon. The young feller behind, well he took three bats and so on.
There were seventeen people in that queue to begin with. But it did my heart good to see people giggling and running back round to the back of the queue again, and so many of them there were.
I think I might have had five turns.
Today's Lesson : Idiocy and Aggravation don't mix
Tuesday 5th May
I have a question. Maybe you can help me.
See, it was an entertaining film, I'll give you that. And if anyone doesn't get why things ended the way they did simply doesn't understand the concept of a prequel origin story. So get a dictionary and read, but right now, I have a question.
No, it's not about the girlfriend / wife who was dead / preganant / lying whatever. I lost touch with what she was saying after about the fourth plot twist to come out of her mouth.
Nope, I have no problem with Liv Tyler playing his brother / monkey / partner / nemesis. Nope. Let that dude go scampering over whatever walls he likes and call me when he's done being a hairy thing.
No. The posing did get a little much at times, especially when he came back in to kick Vic's butt and lost the coat before posing in a painful batstance just to get some attention.
Nor do I have a problem with the awful cgi finishing on some of the claw-work. I mean really, just because the scene in the bathroom looked like it was doodled on in magic marker right onto the film is no reason to have doubts.
No. I don't have a problem with Adamantium Bullets, in an Adamantium Revolver. Actually, I do, that's a stupid plan with a stupid outcome and was written in for stupid people. And Marvel fans (Batman rocks, woo!). But hey, I don't care, it's just a plot device.
No. Ryan Reynolds dying about ten minutes in didn't bother me, that's fine, he's used to turning up and getting shafted on the job, I've probably seen more of his films than you have. But I'm not a fan, not like scarily sending him locks of hair style of fan or anything. That's not my style. He now gets special presents….
…. Oh yes, I have a question.
Why does Wolverine look like his father?
Now that's an ordinary sentence. All the words are in English and the question mark and capital letters are in the correct places. Looking at it, though, you might have thought I've gone insane. More so than usual. Really, don't a lot of people have a family resemblance?
Now I'm going to blow your mind and spoil the whole film for you. Wolverine's Dad has more than a passing resemblance to Australian actor Hugh Jackman. He dies. This annoys Wolverine who then kills the chappy responsible. Who turns out to be his real father.
Hang on.
You see, the father who's a dead ringer for the son isn't actually the father of the boy but merely an adoptive parent who, I bring up again, is the spitting image of the man the child is going to be.
Now that's some freaky genetic coincidences.
Or Wolverine's hidden mutant ability is to be able to look like his first childhood trauma. Which I suppose is lucky that he didn't get sat on by an elephant as an infant.
Yes, that's a spoiler. (the plot thing, not the elephant's bumhole), but all of this happens before the credits roll, so you're just going to have to live with it. Plus IT'S A DAMN PREQUEL… IT DOESN'T MATTER.
Though I'm still quite curious.
Why DOES Wolverine look like his father?
Friday 01st May
Don't you think Carol Vorderman would make an excellent gangland boss?
Have a good bank holiday, see you later.