| |
|
|
Oh, here he is: "Pope, J.P." I didn't know he lived in Twickenham. |
| |
posted by
splush
4:12:04
8:00pm
|
|
Telling strangers about your dreams is what blogs are all about, well, that and photos of your fresh arm scars (Current Music: Now that's what I call Grimm: The best Black Metal Album Ever! 2!). I'm not much into the Goth thing - I'd rather listen to Buzz Caner by Chaos A.D. than Chaos A.D. by Sepultura - but I do occasionally have dreams and some of them are quite interesting, relatively speaking. By relatively speaking I mean compared to "I dreamt that I got a new bass amp and I was all pissed when I woke up. =\ "
Anyway, in this dream I found myself in Ohio (despite never having been to the USA) on the day following George W Bush's announced election victory. Canny Democrat supporters had discovered an unusual loophole in Ohio's polling system - votes were weighted according to penis size. Following this discovery, Ohio's votes were declared void and the voting process would have to be repeated with the appropriate penis measuring equipment/personnel. Partisan wang enthusiasts got quickly to work encouraging confirmed Kerry voters to volunteer for penis enlargement operations which, now that I think about it, would probably get more votes than banging on about the 'nam. Despite not having any voting rights in the USA that I'm aware of, I volunteered for the service, visiting a Democrat vote-enlarging station which was set up in a clothes shop in a mall where I could have my liberty supersized for free. Bear in mind that it wasn't any of that scary surgery nonsense with qualified medical staff, it was the good old vacuum tube method. Alas, just when the story is in full flow, resembling the very finest in democracy-themed erotic literature, the dream reached it's predicable conclusion of me waking up. So, could the Democrats swing the 2nd Ohio vote and take back the electoral college votes Kerry needed to win? We will never know, but if anybody from Ukraine is reading, you might want to get your hands on a vacuum pump before the 26th.
Speaking of Bush states, did you hear that some pro-life pharmacists in Texas are refusing to sell birth control pills because they are "a form of abortion"? Isn't that the wackiest thing? The idea is that birth control pills do not necessarily stop ovulation, and therefore fertilization can begin before the egg is destroyed - the egg has its own DNA and is therefore a new living individual with the appropriate rights. Of course, common sense has something to say about this - surely denying people birth control will increase the number of unwanted pregnancies and therefore the number of abortions? But as we all know by now, common sense really doesn't sell as well in America as Jesus does, and Jesus is pretty pissed off with all the fucking that's going on. For the time being it's only some pharmacists doing this, but if the 'conscience clause' gets popular perhaps we should send the Black Watch in to liberate Texas with the kind of enthusiastic, unabashed, uncomplicated fucking campaign that only Scottish soldiers can carry out. Perhaps we can blame this on Catholics? Nothing I've read seems to blame them but it seems Catholicism is particularily big in Texas, what with all the Mexican neighbours and Irish immigrants. Unfortunately it's hard to be angry at the Catholics when the Pope is such a cool guy.
Fun Pope Facts!
Pope John Paul II is the Best Pope Ever - He's been to more places and he gets way bigger crowds than other Popes, and he doesn't even need to be Italian. He's a Polish lad done good, and I read that he has "beatified and canonised far more persons than any other previous pope in history" and I'm all about canonisation. He is generally a humble guy, opting to refer to himself as "I" instead of the poncy royal "We". When an actor due to play John Paul II had an audience with the man himself he was told "You're crazy to make a film about me. What did I ever do?", which shows off John's humility and wicked sense of humour - because of course the Pope has done loads of stuff - he's Jesus's representative on Earth, for Christ's sake! Wait...
The Pope is Jesus's Representative on Earth - You heard right!
The Pope's official title is bigger and better than yours - He is formally known as "Bishop of Rome, Vicar of Jesus Christ, Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, Supreme Pontiff of the Universal Church, Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of the State of the Vatican City, Servant of the Servants of God.", and some of the Bishops close to him call him Slick.
He dresses like the Prince of Pimps - Most notably, he has a hat every man wants to wear and every woman wants to carefully hand wash. It's actually called a Triregnum and - contrary to popular belief - is not full of delicious treats for him and his bishop pals, it is genuinely just a hat. While reading about the Pope I noticed the phrase "Papal Briefs" but unfortunately it turned out to be some kind of document, not special holy pants. Like many Pimps, John Paul II was once shot, but lived to pimp again, and probably walks with an appropriate pimp limp.
The Pope's election is way gnarly - Recent popes have been elected by a conclave of Cardinals in the motherfucking Sistine Chapel. The Cardinals are locked inside until they come up with a decision, and Cardinals over 80 years old aren't allowed to decide anything because old people are generally crazy. Pope John Paul II is over 80 and still kicking ass because he has magical Jesus energy. Fact.
John Paul II loves football - He was a goalkeeper in his youth, and he once blessed Ronaldo while they were just chilling, discussing how rad Jesus is. It's not all positive though - he gets a bit narked that people tend to spend their Sundays worshipping foorball rather than God, and he clearly didn't deign to give the Italian team any divine support judging by their Euro 2004 performance.
Pope Joan - It was reported in 1250 that a woman had climbed the ranks of the Roman Catholic church by pretending to be a man and made it all the way to Pope before her perfect crime shattered as she went into labour during a procession. Most historians believe this to be a satirical story which came to be believed as reality, but I'm fairly sure satire didn't exist in those days, which basically proves the story to be true.
Pope Urban VII - Urban was a notable Pope for having the shortest papal reign in history - only 13 days, which is what you get if you keep electing 70 year olds into really stressful jobs. Many respected idiots have noted that "urban" is a politically correct media talk for "black", suggesting that Pope Urban VII was bumped off by bigoted bishops (or bigops, and they're technically known).
Vicarius Filii Dei! Am I right, guys? |
|
|
Add Comment - View Comments(17)
|
| |
|
|
Two Minutes to Midnight |
| |
posted by
splush
19:11:04
8:26am
|
|
Well I went to that special midnight opening for Halo 2, hoping to be able to report some kind of wackyness, but the only remotely wacky antics came from the staff who each wore a tinsel halo. Get it? The game is called halo and they're wearing...Yeah I know, it's awesome!
Well anyway, I now know what it's like to be in a long, slow and mainly silent queue in a games shop at midnight, even though I didn't actually have time to play the game until the following evening, which made the whole thing rather absurd. I fortunately finished Halo 2 just in time for Half-Life 2, so I don't have to add it to my silly list of great games I haven't finished (Farcry, Thief: Deadly Shadows, Doom 3, Ninja Gaiden and so on). Halo 2's campaign mode is exactly like all the reviews say so I won't bore you too much with my opinions - Halo fans should be delighted, but those who disliked Halo won't be converted. Although I really believe Halo is set apart from the others by the quality of combat engagements, the story is suitably intruiging and the script is my favorite in any game in recent memory. "I know what the ladies like" indeed. The main thing is the X-Box live play - it's really as fun as Bungie said it would be once you assemble some fun people get the hang of the party system, and I hear that they've speeded up the matchmaking process now so it might just be perfect. Anyone interested in a clan and/or friends network for Weebl's Stuff should check out this thread rather promptly.
Some quick, messy first impressions of Half-Life 2: The physics engine is truly amazing, such that the I'm annoyed when the actual game distracts me from playing around with things. Character models, especially faces, are getting very real very quickly. The game runs fine on my 1.3Ghz processor and for that I love it. It seems to maintain my favorite thing about Half-life's storytelling - the very immersive feeling that you have genuinely walked/driven all this way and you could easily turn around and walk/drive all the way back to the beginning. Finally, it's not as much fun as Halo 2 - yeah, You heard right! I'm not afraid to tell it like it is, regardless of what the man wants me to think! I'm a loose cannon and so on! yeah!
I'm going now! Bye! |
|
|
Add Comment - View Comments(8)
|
| |
|
|
Bet you can't stick it. |
| |
posted by
splush
10:11:04
6:15pm
|
|
So, I've just discovered on my voicemail that the chirpy Irish guy in Game invites me to a special midnight opening to pick up my copy of Halo 2. Just recently I'd been reading about all the midnight openings in the US and thinking how fun they looked, full of smelly nerds - yes, but fun. I didn't think that kind of thing happened in the UK, people actively avoid displaying their enthusiasm for games, keep it indoors and speak of it only in hushed tones. Are people really going to queue in Game in the city centre at midnight, surrounded by bemused drunken gawpers? Naturally, I must find out.
There's a problem, see, I have this big and largely unstarted psychology essay to hand in tommorow at 4pm. My cunning plan was to finish the essay tonight, or at least tommorow morning with Halo 2 as the carrot on my stick. Now I either finish the essay by midnight (which is fairly unlikely - notice I'm avoiding it by writing this) or I somehow finish the essay tommorow in full knowledge that I could just ignore it and play Halo 2.
A regrettable situation indeed, but "Splush," you might be asking, "why are you so excited about Halo 2?", and I'd rather you didn't ask that because I can't really explain it. The reviews (except for some absurdley boot-licking ones) have generally said the single player is too short and uninspired - and will surely be eclipsed by Half-Life 2 - and the graphics are in some respects worse than the first Halo. Multiplayer is certainly a big selling point but, for me, it's more than that: I've been playing FPS games since Doom, and I am going to buy Half-Life 2, but for some reason I know I'll enjoy Halo 2 more than any other game this year. Alternatively, maybe I just got caught up in the hype, but we never like to admit that to ourselves do we? Posters have only started appearing in Edinburgh in the last few days but the internet has been a frothy puddle of Halo 2 hypejuice for months now. I do have a problem dealing with hype - I can't resist constantly reading peoples various views and insights about games on forums, as unimportant as these peoples' views may be. I even visit some of the worst forums there are, most notably Gamefaqs. Gamefaqs is a site you can go to for release information, walkthroughs/FAQs, reviews and similar handy stuff to keep the overenthused nerd foaming at the mouth, but the part which bizarrely keeps pulling me back is the forums. 40% of any game's forum will consist of people from other games' forums coming in to dictate the latter game's dominance. While clearly pointless, it is slightly understandable that people might compare, for example, Doom 3 and Farcry - both FPS games on the same platform. Stranger is peoples' enthusiasm for arguements which are the equivilent to "Cats vs. Cows - Which are better for milking?". When somebody travels from the Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas forum to berate the inhabitants of the Halo 2 forum he will condifently assure us, while calling us fags, that GTA:SA's cat is far better for milking than Halo 2's cow. He will offer a concise but poorly spelled list of reasons why the cow offers such a poor milking experience, with the hope that Halo 2 Cow players farmers will suddenly see the error of their ways and join the future with cat-based farmyards. Of course I realise that it's a bigger arguement than that - our forum invader uses cats only as a tool to spread the word of pets in general - not just cats, not just in farmyards, while the Halo 2 players stalwartly defend cattle and other traditional livestock. Ok I've stretched that metaphor well beyond it's reach so I'll shut up - you all know what I mean, in fact why am I even writing it? You all understood the futility of game/console debates when you were 12. Everyones just trying to convince themselves that either their purchase or their investment of fanboy-hours was worthwhile. I'll buy Halo 2 and I'll buy Half-life 2, and I'd have bought GTA:SA on release day if I had a PS2, let's all just get along and be obsessive about gaming together, yay!
Uh, anyway. I'm probably going to this midnight opening so I'll doubtless report back with the summation of my evaluation of the nation's nerd population. Also I will be dropping more dope-ass rhymes on your bitch ass, boy-ee. |
|
|
Add Comment - View Comments(11)
|
| |
|
|
They're throwing themselves into the road gladly - throwing themselves into the road to escape all this hideousness. |
| |
posted by
splush
1:11:04
4:13pm
|
|
Stupid things I have seen on motor vehicles:
1 - Mirrored logo
The internet has just informed me that N.I.C. Distribution is a company which will buy furniture from the Ikea in Edinburgh and take it to Aberdeen, Inverness and Elgin. I've been to all these places and I have to feel sorry for anybody who goes to Inverness regularly, I've also been to Ikea and the same sentiment applies. Anyway, I just saw one of their vans heading North - presumably stocked to the roof with tedious flat-packs - and noticed that they have their company logo printed on the front of the vehicle mirrored. You know, like ambulances. Now I always thought that the likes of ambulances needed the mirrored text so that a drivers in front would be able to determine the nature of the gleaming white wailing monster behind them as fast as possible and get the hell out the way, because little Gary has to get to the hospital to have the fork removed from the roof of his mouth and time is of the essence. I can only assume N.I.C. consider their task to be equally, or more, important to that of paramedics. I'm the first to admit that the piles of pastel coloured cushions on your gaudy sofa can never be quite big enough, but Aberdeen's need for soft furnishings is probably not as time-critical as N.I.C. seem to think.
Fun fact: I went to Ikea recently and saw that you can get child-sized duvet cover/pillowcase sets with a delightful 'covered in ants' motif. That is to say it was densely covered with images of black ants against a white background - when the child lifts his head from the pillow half-asleep he sees a bunch of 2" long ants milling about under his head. That child's nightmares will be so bad I actually have nightmares about his nightmares.
2 - I'm not an OAP, I'm a recycled teenager!
I saw this slogan on a sticker adorning the rear window of a big, bright, chunky 4x4: probably a KIA Sorento or something. When an old person speaks it carries weight - you think you're about to hear the product of a rich lifetime's accumululated experiences - this makes it particularly hurtful when an old person tells you thoughtless, uninformed lies. The guy driving sure was old, most likely an OAP, in fact: this was the first issue I had with the sticker. I guess the elderly can be forgiven for not having even a basic understanding of the recycling - in their day the environment was to be treated with a bitter contempt exhibited now by only the Spanish. Also, music had proper songs and comedians didn't have to say 'cunt' to be funny. Had the driver paid attention to developments in ecology over the past 30 years instead of endlessly listening to Jim Davidson tapes and lamenting the incidental music used on Match of the Day he would have understood the process of recylcing a teenager is as follows:
- Used teenager is discarded in appropriately marked recycling bin.
- Teenager is taken to the recycling plant where unwanted parts such as plastic wrapping, staples etc. are removed.
- Teenager is shredded, pulped and mixed with chemical preservatives.
- The resulting pulp joins that of other teenagers to form a mixture the industry calls a 'pulp commune' - like a punk commune but with less misdirected anger and gobbing.
- Pulp commune is fed into moulds which squeeze out the moisture and shape the pulp into a new baby.
- Baby is packaged accordingly in a basket and given to storks for distribution.
So, logically, the product of recycling a teenager is a new baby person who will grow up to be a new teenager - but get this: each time the recycling process takes place the teenager's fibre gets more and more impurities and a lower quality baby is produced. This is the main contributing factor to the downfall of today's youth - not socioligical factors like you thought, not even rap music. Regardless, they still seem to be better than old people.
3 - Experience is what you get when you get what you don't want
Another slogan - a very different perpetrator. This independent building contractor didn't have the excuse of senility on their side. The slogan can be interpreted in a couple of different ways:
A - You get 'experience' when you hire building contractors who produce results contrary to your demands, but (presumably) this building contractor will produce adequate results, and as such you will be spared from accumulating more 'experience'. This version requires you interpret 'experience' as a negative thing, contrary to all previous, um, experience.
B - This company has experience, which is a good thing. We got experience by enduring undesirable situations such as a roof we built falling apart, or a customer failing to pay us for the same roof. As such, we have either learned to build better roofs, or we have employed really good lawyers to ensure you pay the quoted price regardless of work quality. You have to guess which of these we did.
Neither of these interpretations would fill me with confidence, but I still applaud the company for trying to construct a more inventive slogan than something like "Simply the best!". Although "Simply the best!" does make the choice of music for your local radio advert mercifully straightforward.
Bonus wacky vehicle image!
Australia knows how to party on the Halo 2 hype tram, aww yeah! |
|
|
Add Comment - View Comments(7)
|
| |
|
|
I can't think of a title for this. |
| |
posted by
splush
26:10:04
5:16pm
|
|
As you probably already know by now if you're in the UK, John Peel died today. For the benefit of those from outside the UK, John Peel was (primarily) a radio DJ who pushed new cutting edge music constsitantly harder than anyone else since the '60s. He really represented how vital music radio could be and kept a nightly show on Radio 1 right up until the end while the rest of the station turned to bland playlisted nonsense around him.
I've got so many memories of listening to him on Radio 1 while doing schoolwork, writing down song names as he read them out. His blindingly eclectic tastes fueled a show where you could hear Cuban folk music followed by Squarepusher followed by a garage recording by some unsigned suburban teenage band, and he never neglected the importance of live sessions.
It's impossible to describe how important and iconic John Peel is. This will touch the nation's collective consciousness more deeply than any other entertainer I could think of. He deserves a memorial on a similar scale to Princess Diana's, but instead of Elton John playing there'd be a set by the Undertones. |
|
|
Add Comment - View Comments(6)
|
|
|
| |
Random Link: |
Nebulus
Flash verion of fantastic C64 game |
|
 |
|
