Rotten Apples

So my iPod has finally died. Well, semi-died. And I have to admit I'm slightly annoyed. It's an iPod Nano 5G - the one with the camera on it - and up until about two weeks ago it worked perfectly and I pretty much took it everywhere with me. It provided tunes in the car (via my slightly antiquated tape-deck adapter) and it provided the motivation I need when I go running. Alas, a few weeks ago it started playing up. Namely, the 'wheel' stopped registering commands and only worked intermittently when I tried to lower or raise the volume and then last week it just died on me altogether. It works fine when attached to the (expensive) dock/speaker thing I bought a few months back, but once it's disconnected it just shuts down and dies. I had a quick look around the iPod forums online and discovered that I'm clearly not the only person who has suffered from this rather infuriating iPod 'death' and it seems that the only way to remedy the problem is to send the thing off to Apple who will attempt to repair or replace the thing for an extortionate amount of money. And they can fuck right off. I've already spent £120 on the thing - I'm not paying to have it fixed when the fault is their...erm...fault! Apparently it's some kind of battery malfunction that stops the iPod from holding a charge, thus rendering it useless unless it is connected to a power source. Grrr. This is, infact, the third iPod I have owned and had go tits up on me. The first two were iPod Shuffles - a first (long and white) and a second (with a clip) generation. They both stopped working due to charging issues. Now this one, my third and most expensive one has also stopped working as it should due to charging issues. I'm seeing a developing trend here.

Here's another developing trend: I will never buy another Apple product for as long as I live. They've had enough of my cash for their products just to fuck up after a few months of moderate use. And to think that my first 'proper' job after I left University was working for an Apple-authorised dealer! Yes, I was a sales monkey at a Apple dealer in Manchester and my days usually consisted of demonstrating the (then) new Power Mac G5 to potential customers and trying to show people why they should go for an iMac instead of an eMac even though at home I had a PC and wouldn't have had anyMac (see what I did there?) even if they gave me one for free. Sure - they look nice...but what, exactly, can you do on them that you can't do on a PC for less money and with more support?! Pfft. Indeed, one of the managers was trying to persuade me to purchase a teeny weeny Powerbook through the staff finance system and as such let me borrow a brand new one for a few days. I got it home and unboxed it, marvelled at the tinyness of it with my housemates...and then it just sat there in my room until I took it back to work because all it had on it was the OS. Great fun.

We also had a load of those old skool iPods with the black and white screen and an actual 'wheel' that span round on the front instead of the fuck-up prone 'touch wheel' that the newer ones have. I bet those fuckers are still working now...unlike my Nano. It makes me want to fucking scream. As a result of Apple's crappiness, I'm having to use my Palm Pre in the gym or when I go running and even though it's pretty small as far as phones go, it's still like having a pebble in your pocket when you're out pounding pavement.

I've decided that as soon as I've got the cash, I'm going to just buy a normal MP3 player again. Sure, it won't be able to utilise the admittedly brilliant iTunes-based music transfer interface I know and love...but Apple - you've lost a customer here. I'll Probably just go down to Argos and pick up a mid-range Phillips or Creative player (or maybe another Sansa Clip, if they still make them), and hopefully it'll last longer than a few months. Gah...

Books and Boredom

Hello there. Me again. Finished my book yesterday - Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell. And what a book it is/was. It's an account of the trials and tribulations faced by the author as he tries to eek out a meagre living whilst looking for work in Paris, and then later living as a tramp in London in the late 1920s. Reading it, you'd be forgiven for thinking the book is a factual account of Orwell's personal experiences (indeed, I though it was), but upon researching the book on the net and looking at Orwell's biography, it appears that the tale is a work of fiction. Fiction based in fact, but fiction nonetheless. Which was a bit surprising considering the amount of detail Orwell goes in to when describing his various situations throughout the story. Fact or not though, the book is a fantastic read and you'd never guess it was Orwell's first proper novel if no-one told you. I was a little sad when I finished it - kind of like how I felt when I completed Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I played that fucker from start to finish in about 2 weeks whilst I was in the first year of my A Levels, and when I finally restored the land of Hyrule to it's former glory, I was gutted. Gutted because in the back of my mind a little voice was saying "now what?!"

So, while the various inhabitants of Kokiri Village and Hyrule Castle were engaging in an eternal dance of victory, muggins here was sat there wondering how the fuck he was going to continue to fill his evenings. And good as it was, I'm not the kind of person who completes a game, only to start again and repeat it. What's the point in that? You've already seen everything so why do it again? OK, so I didn't catch a massive fish in the hut on the shores of Lake Hylia...but who gives a fuck? Reminds me of Metal Gear Solid on the PSX. Yeah - it was a fucking incredible game...but do I really want to replay the entire thing just because Snake is now wearing a tuxedo? I think not.

But going back to Down and Out in Paris and London, I feel that it was such an amazing book and painted such vivid images in my head that I don't think I can read anything else for a few days. Just need to get over it's brilliance before I start on The Road to Wigan Pier. I've also got Animal Farm (as mentioned t'other day) and The Clergyman's Daughter to read, but I've never heard of the latter so may read that last. It seems that I've become slightly obsessed with George Orwell in recent months, but I suppose an obsession with a dead author and his work is more desirable and less destructive than an obsession with drugs, booze, prostitution, crime or vandalism...right?!

I also managed to get hold of some second hand HP Lovecraft short story collections when I was in Bath (love that place) a few weeks back, and I've already smashed through some of them. Slight deviation from Orwell, being horror and all, but they're very good. Noticed severe over use of the term 'waning' when describing the moon...but who am I to argue with the creator of Cthulu (pictured above, yesterday)?!

On a different note, I've started road running again. Went on a few lengthy runs at the start of last week whilst I was up in Manchester, but running through a city like that is fraught with perils - namely busy roads and bus stops crammed with people who simply refuse to get out of your way even though they can see you coming a mile away with your luminous yellow top on. Running in Somerset is somewhat more enjoyable (if running can be described thus) due to the quiet lanes, stunning scenery and over-powering stench of cow shit that wafts like a wraith across hill and dale. Well, maybe not the last point, but you get the idea. Been for three Somerset runs this week and will be embarking on my fourth today. I'll be doing it at dinner time just so I can get off this godawful base for an hour or so. Small pleasures.

Been thinking about my future over the past few weeks. Well, my employment future. I'm quite unhappy with my current job and can't decide whether to put my notice in or not. I really miss city life and wouldn't mind leaving the navy and going to live somewhere like Bristol and just working in an office or a shop or something. Sounds a bit dull, I know, but I really miss having some kind of stability in my life. As it is, I never know where I'm going to be from one month to the next - even now I have no idea how long I'm based in my current location so I simply can't make any plans or think about my future on a personal level. It's quite unsettling not to know where you're going to be in a year's time...which may be great if you're 19 and have no worries in the world...but when you're almost 30 and it's a little worrying. I've got no home, is what I'm getting at, and it's an awful feeling knowing that there's nowhere you can retreat to when things get a little stressful. Hmmm. Leaving the relative security of the services right now just because I don't like my current position may seem a little hasty, but that's just how I feel. My next draft may be fucking awesome and actually live up to everything I thought being in the navy would mean...but so far, I'm decidedly unimpressed with the lifestyle and the levels of abject boredom I'm privy to. Wouldn't mind working on an oil rig or something to be honest, but where does one start when trying to transfer into a career like that?! Something to think about, for sure.

Until next time, bitches!

Austerity Measures

Well here we are, only 10 days into the month of August and already I'm worrying about having no money. How? Well, it's down to my age old problem of going out on the piss and spending way, way too much money. It's something I do far too regularly for my own liking and it's got to fucking stop sooner rather than later. Here's the scenario: I go out on a Friday or Saturday night. I plan to spend a set amount, say £30, so I take it out of the cash machine before the evening begins. A few hours later and after several pints of lager or cider, I decide that I'm not drunk enough yet (I'm probably smashed already, I hasten to add) and then proceed back to the cash point and draw out another ridiculous sum of money. Cue more drinking, ridiculous behaviour and waking up in the morning with a massive hangover, feelings of regret and a gigantic hole in my bank balance. And this destructive cycle has happened not once or twice, but thrice this month so far. And I'm fucking sick of myself for it.

Granted, the nights out I've had have been pretty good, but this is besides the point. By the middle of the month, I don't want to be scabbling around in the dirt for enough money for some petrol, a loaf of bread or a day out. It's no way to live and after next month's trip to Paris (more later), it fucking ENDS.

The nights out? Well, the main one was a trip to Bristol that culminated in a stay in a backpacker's hostel. It was a really good night out to be fair and I always enjoy taking in the experience of an unfamiliar city, it's just that the excursion signalled the start of my week of unbridled spending. That was on the Friday. The Sunday saw me take a car trip up to Manchester and the petrol wasn't exactly cheap, and the following few days were a flurry of nights out, meals and trying to entertain myself while various friends and family members were at work. As a side note, I must stress that whenever I do go back home, I kind of feel obliged to go out with alarming regularity simply because I have various groups of friends that are totally unconnected and others who can never make agreed meetings due to working hours etc. I obviously feel honoured that people actually want to see me and make arrangements to do so...it's just that it all adds up price-wise. Which leads to my current and rather boring predicament.

Anyway, I'm back at work now and I fucking hate it, but what can one do? At least sitting here and writing this crap, worrying about what I've done and how I'm going to survive the rest of the month means I can't go out and blow the meagre sum I have left on ridiculous, wasteful and unessecary sheight. Urgh. Speaking of work though, I believe I only have around 5 months left in this truly hideous position before I am 'drafted' back into my actual, trained branch. I can't actually put into words how happy this makes me feel...but more about this (maybe) in a future post.

Anyway, must try to stay positive and learn from my mistakes. Although changing the habit of a lifetime will be tough. But tough it must be, or I'll never break this fucking horrendous cycle. I need to start saving, so that's what I'm gonna do instead of go out drinking and wasting money. You'll see. In exactly one year from this post, I'll tell you how much I've managed to save up. Mark my words.

Next week (Monday) I'm off to see the final show of Jimmy Carr's UK tour down in Weymouth with my lady. Actually really looking forward to it. I saw Frankie Boyle live in Bournemouth a few months back and he was brilliant so I'm expecting similar things from Carr. Well, he's pretty funny on TV so I'm guessing it'll be more of the same at his live show, right?! Knowing my luck though, Jimmy Carr will fall ill the day before the show and we'll have to endure an hour and a half of Lenny Henry instead as a back-up act. A man so unfunny he makes cancer look like Shooting Stars.

Random interlude: I had no idea Scott Mills, the Radio 1 DJ, is a big gay. I read it on this thing called the 'Pink List' on the Sunday Telegraph website when I logged on to the internet this morning. I thought it might have just meant he was a gay icon or some shit, but when I looked at his Wikipedia page, it confirmed that Mills came out in 2001 and now prefers the cock. He kept that quiet. Let me clarify that this in now way changes my opinion that the guy is the most tolerable of all the cunts who spout their shite on that godawful station, I just found it quite suprising. Probably won't listen to him anymore, like, but hey. And for those who can't tell - that was a JOKE. Not the gay bit...the not listening bit...erm...

Cough. Anyway.

Decided to smash though all of George Orwell's back catalogue after reading his classic 1985 last week. I've already read Animal Farm and bits of The Road to Wigan Pier, but that was years ago so I'm starting again. This time, however, I'm starting with Down and Out in Paris and London....something I'm likely to be next month if I don't try my damnedest to save some of the remnants of this month's wage to supplement my/our jaunt to the French capital at the beginning of September.

Nights into Dreams

Something is wrong. I finished my shift at 0630 this morning and only managed to get about 2 and a half hours sleep before I had to get up again...and I've been up since then (and been to the gym. And Tesco. And Gamestation), but yet I don't feel even slightly tired. True, I've had about 15 cups of coffee today, but still - I should surely be feeling some kind of lethargy. Maybe it'll kick in at 3am and I'll get court-martialled for falling asleep on duty. Ah well.

As I mentioned just a few sentences ago, this afternoon saw me venture to Gamestation with all of my 360 games with a view to swapping them for something I'll actually play. Previous hopes of getting a good trade-in value for Modern Warfare 2 didn't come to fruition though, as the cunts would only give me £18.50 for six (yes - SIX) games. They were: Fifa 09, Fifa 10, Modern Warfare 2, Red Faction: Guerrilla and Project Gotham 3. I left with Lost Planet 2 and Project Gotham 4. Doesn't really add up thet - especially considering that I also had to pay an extra fiver. But hey. Fresh games come at a price.

Not played PGR 4 yet, but Lost Planet 2 appears to be quite a good shooter in which you get to run around a jungle shooting massive aliens with massive guns. I'll post more in-depth thoughts on it when I've played more than the first few chapters, but initial impressions are positive.

Speaking of jungles, guns and aliens - I went to see Predators last week. Wish I hadn't bothered. That's because it's a nonsensical load of old bilge. Sure - it's better than both of the AvP movies (fuck, eating dog shit is more enjoyable than either of those celluloid carbuncles), but there are so many "eh?!" moments peppered throughout the film that I left with more questions than answers as to what the fuck was going on. OK - I get the basic premise: humans are dropped onto an alien world and then hunted by the Predators...but why is that other Predator strung up on that totem pole thing? And why do the 'dog' things disappear halfway through? And why is Lawrence Fishburn a big fat cunt if he's been living off the land and fighting Predators for so long? And what's with all the half-assed pseudo references to the first film? See where I'm going with this? Basically, I didn't like it. It wasn't a complete disaster (see AvP Requiem for that), but it was well below par in my humble opinion. I just hope the rumoured Aliens prequels end up being semi-decent, or I'm giving up on both franchises.

I might go and watch Inception next week as it's one film I've been looking forward to for some time. That, and Di Caprio's movies are generally quite good. In fact, most of the films I've seen with him in have been pretty damn decent: The Aviator, The Beach, The Departed, Catch Me If You Can...the list goes on. Hopefully Inception will be added to that list, and if the reviews are anything to go by, it won't disappoint. The only slight issue I have with the concept of the movie is thus: all of the 'dream' clips I've seen tend to be set in real-word locations like cities or hotel corridors etc. How often do actual dreams resemble anything like real life? Sure, some do, but the vast majority of my dreams (well, the ones I can remember) seem to take place either in completely unrealistic places or just 'nowhere' and don't actually have a narrative or logical sequence of events. OK- maybe having dream sequences in a film where a frying pan just floats about in front of a rainbow wouldn't actually lend itself to any kind of decent or coherent storyline, but Hollywood always makes 'dreams' out to be totally legible things - not just a load of completely random bollocks...which is what the vast majority of mine are. Just thinking out loud, people.

Anyway. I'm off to heat up some ASDA Smart Price soup in the microwave. Now that's the stuff of dreams. Or is it nightmares?

Perplexions of a Dangerous Mind

Howdy. Been off for the past week and couldn't be arsed writing owt. That, and it's been quite sunny so I've had no inclination to sit indoors on my laptop writing arse just for no fucker to read. But now I'm back for another week of the dreaded night shift, so blog away I will!

Just read on the BBC News website that PC Zone magazine is closing down in September. Seems that a lot of mags are being wound down at the moment because no-one is buying them. I'm not particularly fussed about PC Zone shutting it's doors as I've probably only read it once or twice (I've always been more of a PC Gamer kinda guy), but it's still sad that yet another mag is going to the wall. During my teenage years, my whole life was gaming - buying/swapping games, talking about games, arguing about games, fighting - yes, fighting - about games and reading/writing about games. I was obsessed with games and more to the point, games mags. I regularly bought about 3 or 4 of the things a month and still have the vast majority of them stacked up in a bedroom at my dad's gaff. There are hundreds of them and if someone with a sadder life than mine actually wanted to arrange them in date order (requests via email, peeps), you could probably see which console I had at the time due to the leanings in the purchased content.

I used to get CVG and Gamesmaster every month anyway, but along with those I bought stuff like Mean Machines Sega, Saturn Power, Official Saturn Mag, N64 Magazine, DC-UK, Dreamcast Magazine etc. Because of the mags, It soon came about that I started to think that maybe I could become a games journalist and began writing reviews for a local newspaper (South Manchester Area News...anyone know if it's still going?!). I did that for about 2 years all in all and got paid £20 per article...which was a fair old bit for a tramp like me back then. As usual, this isn't going anywhere - I just thought I'd regale you with a tale of Tomleecee of yore. A trampy, skint cunt who played too many computer games and wanted to write about them for a living. It didn't work out as I planned - I'm in the navy now. But who knows where I'll be in 20 years. I could be the editor of Edge by then. And if I am, I'll sack the whole editorial team and reform the team from Amiga Power circa 1994 and turn it into a decent, fun and entertaining periodical. Edge: taking the fun out of gaming since time began.

So yeah, PC Zone is no more. Which is sad. Sort of.

Did some volunteering last week. I've not suddenly become some kind of charitable avenger of justice - I just did it to avert my attention from the boredom of living in Hades (Somerset). The week before, I signed up with a volunteering website and then someone from the Council rang me a few days later...and viola - the following week I was building a gate in a field. Oh, and removing some graffiti from a fence. And pulling up weeds. It was a pretty good day to be honest and quite a good laugh. I may go back and help out again next week - it certainly beats walking around the town centre on my Jack Jones looking at crap in shops that I don't really want or need but am buying because my life is dull and void of interesting shit. Although, speaking of interesting shit - I'm going to Paris in September with my ladyfriend. Actually quite excited as I've never been to France before - hell, I've never organised a holiday before - so it's a whole new (grown-up(ish)) experience for me. Me - doing 'grown-up' shit. There's an oxymoron right there. Hmmm.

The hotel I've booked is pretty basic (and has received some horrendous reviews), but to be fair - I don't give a flying toss. I spent the early part of my life living in battered wives refuges and homeless families hostels so I'm sure I can handle sleeping in a basic-looking hotel for a week. Furthermore, I'm not going to be sitting in the fucking hotel 24 hours a day - I'm going to be out and about and revelling in the culture and hustle bustle of a 24-hour continental capital city. It's going to be about as far removed from fucking Yeovil as you can possibly get. And for that, I am truly, truly thankful. That's because - and I make no apologies whatsoever for the following statement - Yeovil is a boring cess-hole. But I digress.

Completed the single player campaign on Modern Warfare 2 today. I'm a bit perplexed. Y'see - I was just getting in to it...and then it ended. What a goddamn joke! And what a crap final scene! Sure - I'm happy to take back my previous comments about the game, but the ending is such an anti-climax. Bah! And what's all that shit with the museum thing at the end?! Bizarre. I'm going to take it to Gamestation this week and swap it for Alan Wake or Lost Planet 2. Hopefully they'll give me a decent trade-in amount for it as they've bumped the price of a new copy back up to £44.99...aaaand here I am talking about swapping games again. Old habits die hard, evidently.

I've got more stuff to write about, but I'm going to try and stretch it across the week. Because it gives me something to do when I'm at work, to be honest. Bye bye, me hearties.

Topical Thunder

Imagine sitting in a tiny cell for 12 hours a day with nothing to do but constantly get up to hand ignorant fuckwits a key that they bark the number of as they walk through the door. Imagine doing that for seven days a week. Welcome to my hellish existence. And people wonder why I sometimes appear to be a miserable cunt. Yep, my job involves little more than what I have just described, only augmented with a liberal dose of boredom and a good dollop of feeling like a worthless bitch. So, the next time you may think your job is dull or maybe a little monotonous, spare a thought for me sat in this horrible, tungsten-lit nightmare...where every fucking day is exactly the same. Groundhog day ain't got shit on this...at least Bill Murray could kill himself in inventive ways, safe in the knowledge that he'd wake up again the next morning to the ambient chords of Sonny and Cher. Damn him and his fortune. Damn Bill Murray to hell.

Just seen an advert in the jobs section at the back of The Sun (the newspaper, not the heavenly body) that is advertising a position with a salary between £40k and £100k per annum. What is slightly bizarre though, is that it doesn't actually state what the job entails...just that you need your own car. I'm guessing for that kind of cash, it won't be delivering Grattan catalogues to council houses in Merseyside. Saying that, it could be delivering catalogues to houses in Newcastle - the massive wages coming in the form of danger money, what with that nutter running about with a shotgun up there. Topical and humourous? That'll be me. Guffaw.

It's 'Air Day' this weekend at the base that I'm currently calling 'home.' What this means is that the airfield will be opened up to thousands of plane-spotting geeks and their spoilt, bratty, posh children so that they can wander around taking photographs of old planes and marvel at the Vulcan bomber as it soars overhead burning thousands of pounds worth of aviation fuel every few minutes. Not that I'm all about berating the Vulcan. I've seen it flying a few times at various airshows I worked at whilst I was a recruiter, and it's a pretty impressive sight. I'm just being a moany biatch because I hate my job (see paragraph one, above). That's enough cock and bull for one day. See you next time for more of the same. Bye!

Minimal Pretention

Hello. You must excuse my absence from bloggage...it's just that nowt has really been happening that I thought anyone would want to read about. Saying that - does anyone actually blog about stuff anyone else wants to read about? The answer is: NO. I've been looking at some other blogs on blogger, and the vast majority are complete and utter arse. I'm not saying that the shit I write on here is any less arse, but at least I fucking know that what I compose comes under that heading. I can't actually explain why I get so riled up about this, but blogs with stupid, in-jokey names and have posts about the most mundane crap written in some kind of obtuse manner in order to make the author appear to be a troubled literary genius...well, they fuck me right off. Don't use long words where you can use a short one, dickhead, because contrary to what you may think, it actually just makes you look like a fucking cunt. Oh, and you're not a troubled genius - you're a pathetic amoeba scrawling excrement all over the internet and nobody cares what it is you're scrawling, big words included. So there. And my dad could beat up your dad, too.

As an experiment, go to the top of this page and click 'next blog' or whatever it is in the blogger navigation bar thingy. Chances are, the next blog will be some minimalist bullshit with a little entry written about raindrops on a window with a sultry image of the author holding a rose. FUCK OFF! I wouldn't mind if it was meant to be a joke or something, but the vast majority aren't! Aaaaargh!

Anyhow. Now I've got that off my chest...what else? Went and watched Shrek Forever After the other day with 'er indoors. A word of advice: never go to watch a kid's film at 6pm. Because, invariably, the theatre will be full of...erm...kids. As this one was. Fucking thousands of the little cunts. All screeching and whooping and cackling at the screen. Now, I realise that what I'm saying here is making me sound like Victor Meldrew...but fuck it - I don't give a toss. The film was pretty good...the surroundings slightly annoying due to having to strain to hear the film over all the prepubescent hollering. Furthermore, when we emerged from the cinema, I managed to fall down the steps and land on my back like a complete retard. Winner!

The day after, I went down to Plymouth and got hammered. Which was all well and good...except the drive 'home' on Sunday was slightly emotional due to the fact that I kept (almost) nodding off at the wheel of the inglorious Proton. I stopped a few times in order to get it together, but it was no use - I just had to power through. Got back in one piece though, so it's all good.

Look, I told you there was fuck all interesting happening at the moment.

Another rant though: Facebook. Again.

Right, on my phone (Palm Pre), I used to be able to access three different versions of Facebook: The official Palm 'app,' the official Facebook 'touch' site, and the actual proper version of Facebook that you get on your PC. Now, for some reason I can no longer access the proper version of the site, just the two cut-down 'mobile' sites. These are all well and good for updating statuses etc, but they are too basic to do anything else...you can't view photos without the thing locking up, you can't view photo comments, you can't actually do anything of any real use...in short, it's fucking useless. The thing is, somehow, the powers that be at Facebook have engineered it so that you can no longer access the full site, even if you put the normal url into the address bar...it just reverts to the 'touch' version. Why? WHY?! Fucking arseholes.

I'm off to look at some more pretentious blogs with stupid names. Adios!