I injured myself about a week ago. Actually, no, it was exactly a week ago, last Friday, the 27th of November, that's when it happened. That is the when, as to the how, I've no idea. That's the perplexing thing. I went to bed fine, and when I woke up my right arm felt a little dead, you know, that kind of feeling you get when you've slept on your arm? That's what it felt like. So, I thought nothing of it. I went about my day, I did normal, everyday Terence things (we are an industrious folk, us Terences, so long as that industry involves being lazy, watching cartoons, and playing video games we can go all day), all the while with that little twinge that should have had me worrying.
The next day, Saturday, it was really quite painful. The pain had bloomed during the night. I went around to a friend's house and did normal friend things, like being lazy, watching cartoons, and playing video games (for they are Terencian in those ways), and....I don't know....I never let on or complained about the pain. All day and night, I was surreptitiously moving my arm about, putting it behind my head or something (really weird thing, putting the arm up and behind the head gave some relief from the pain...I figure it must be something to do with the pressure on the muscle or something, but then, I don't know, because surely gravity would also be acting on it....or maybe angels were high fiving the pain away...I don't know! You come up with a theory then, looking at me like I'm crazy, pfft, it is not I who am crazy...it is I who am mad!), which made it okay for like a moment or two, then the pain would come back with it's bigger brother and kick my ass for chatting back.
Then, Sunday morning. Oh boy, was that fun. I couldn't get out of bed. I couldn't move. When I was a kid, I was ran over by a car. I think i've talked about that before, I nearly lost a a foot, it had to be literally sewn back on....that didn't hurt half as much as Sunday morning. Well, maybe it did, I don't know, pain is weird in that sense. Like, you can imagine pain right, someone puts the visual in your mind of being stabbed in the eye or whatever, with a needle, you go 'ah, wtf, bleugh' and shiver, right? But remembering pain? That's much harder. At least it is for me, and I assume it's a universal thing because I've not met anyone who can actually remember physical pain. Mental pain, sure, but physical? Not so much. And I talk about this a lot with people, because I'm weird like that....anyway, it was pretty bad, I couldn't move for the pain. At least for a good half hour anyway, I just kind laid there and cried. Then I remembered my ninja turtle training, rolled off my back, and got a taxi to the A&E.
Here's where I could go on a rant about the NHS. Because they didn't examine me. No scans, no poking, no prodding, nada. Just, 'you're in pain,' 'yessum,' 'is it really bad?' 'yessum,' 'cool, here's a prescription for some pain meds strong enough to kill a small elephant, go have fun.' 'aye sir!' Because....and I know that it must be awfully disheartening to be a doctor at times, especially in a shithole of a city like Liverpool, and it's hard to believe when there's a real case because of every arsehole scouser who comes into the clinic with their 'aw, but lad, i've got this like, real pain, giz us some meds like', but iono, it just seemed really unprofessional to sign off on something like that without an examination. But then, that's the NHS for you.
Since then, life's been shit. I had to actually stay off university because I couldn't get dressed (literally couldn't put my pants, shoes and socks on, because it hurt far too much, even with the meds, even with my left hand). I'd not missed any education or work thing since I was fourteen or so....at least, not for a legitimate reason....I mean, I've stayed off plenty of times because laziness or dropping out of college and whatever, but that was always my decision. It was somewhat galling to be forced to the sidelines. That a physical impairment kept me out of the action, as it were. I don't like being reminded of my own mortality, and that's happened a lot this past week. When I was in my late teens, early twenties, it used to keep me awake at night. Again, I think this is something I've talked about before, something that I'd mostly gotten over, but it's been back this week, because I've not been able to read books, play video games, go to university and what not, and also, the pain in the arm has been keeping me awake at night and that's when the thoughts creep in. When the shadows curl and twist around the silence...
It's still hurting now. The arm, I mean, it's still quite tender and the hand's numb. I tried writing before and well, my already messy handwriting is even messier because I can't hold the pen right....even typing this out has been kind of a chore because, and I don't know why this is the case, but my co-ordination is off....like, I keep hitting the keys above and/or to the side of the one I want to hit....I don't know if it's just because I've not typed anything in over a week (with the right hand anyway) or what, I don't know...that's kinda scary in itself though....that it's a skill that can be 'lost', as it were, in just a week....I'm hoping it's just the meds and the fact that the muscle's still kind of twinging.
Anyway, that's all I have to say right now....and jesus, how many words did I have to use to not say not really much of anything at all...
Friday, 4 December 2015
Sunday, 1 March 2015
Salt
Salt is weird. Like, thousands of years ago, salt was super
important so much so it was basically currency but it came from the ocean.
Specifically salt encrusted rocks...what happy accident was that then?! Some
caveman family was at the seaside, one of them accidentally dropped their
mammoth sandwich (in that it was big and also made from a mammoth) on one of
the rocks and, being an unfussy eater, ate the sandwich then turned around to
the others "Okay dudes, you're not going to
believe me, but this rock, this one right here, this rock is delicious!"
and so, sceptical at first, they all started wiping sandwiches on seaside rocks
and found that they loved it.
Or the other explanation is that salty tasting meals exist
naturally in...nature...so, ancient humans went on quests to find more
accessible salts. Which would be fun to imagine. A caveman scientist, "Day
1, just invented numbers, very happy side effect of quest for salt. Tried
licking a porcupine...porcupine seemed to enjoy it, but my tongue did not for
varying reasons. Will update log again tomorrow." The next day, "Day
2. Just invented linear concept of time, very happy, though now also somewhat
aware of own mortality which is rather uncomfortable. Mission for salt
continues, got grandmother to try sucking eggs as per Jeff's suggestion, she
said they could use some salt. Will update log again tomorrow." The third
day, "Day 3, decided to take a break today with the family, went to the
beach. A good time was had by all until Jeff dropped his sandwich on the floor.
He caused a scene until I offered to give him my sandwich and I'd eat the one
off the floor because it's the stone age and who really cares about germs,
apart from Jeff. Found that the sandwich now had salt on it, rocks make salt,
fellow salt hunters very happy with my discovery." "Day 4, Jeff
suggested salt was actually in the water and that we could harvest it by
boiling said water. Crazy Jeff, salt is a solid, not a liquid, he'll never be a
scientist like me if he continues to think like that."
I did originally have an ending for this, but I forgot it...so,
erm, lets talk about dinosaurs instead. Now dinosaur means "terrible
lizards" which is a fantastically inaccurate name as they were neither at
all terrible nor lizards. But that is a story for another day, smoke bomb!
*flees in confusion*
Monday, 29 December 2014
Zeus, am I right?
Zeus was doing his usual Zeus thing, chatting up a mortal priestess (ancient greek devouts were so much open to seduction) named Io, when Hera came along and was all like "Zeus, you better not be hitting on some human again?!" and so Zeus, being that he was the king of the gods, was crafty and quick enough to change Io into a cow before his wife could catch them together.
Hera though, being that she was the Queen of the gods and also, you know, knowing what Zeus was like, was suspicious when she found her husband with his arms wrapped around a cow and so, using her wit, proclaimed "Oh, what a fabulous gift you've got for me there, I've always wanted a cow!" and Zeus was forced to give over poor Io to Hera.
However, thinking quickly, Zeus burst out "Ah, but we live on Mount Olympus, can't take cows up a mountain, they're very terrestrial, scared of heights, don't you know."
Hera conceded the point but insisted that the cow be kept in her sacred olive grove (somehow not a euphemism) and watched over by her friend, Argos, who was a giant with like, so many eyes, just, freaking, so many, it was weird. Hera knew that loyal Argos would keep an eye (or two, or fifty, or a hundred) on Io at all times because he never closed them all at once.
However, she had not banked on Hermes, who Zeus sent to kill Argos because that's the logical reaction to being cockblocked by your wife. Send your son to kill her friend. Anyway, Hermes went there and tried to get Argos to leave the cow unattended, but no matter what he did he couldn't get the giant to close all his eyes at the same time. He tried spells and hexes, he tried playing soothing lullabies on his lyre, nothing would work until he started spouting on about the history of musical instruments ("Hey, did I ever tell you how I made the first lyre? First, I got this turtle right...." and on he goes, oy) which knocked the giant out. Then, Hermes lopped Argos' head off with a sickle because fucker was hardcore.
As it turns out, Zeus had kind of moved on by this point and didn't really care anymore. He went off to do Zeus things. Argos' eyes got put on peacock tails because they were Hera's favourite bird. Hermes got no comeuppance. And as for Io, well, she eventually got turned back into a human, after being cursed by Hera to madness by gadfly (just one, that couldn't be gotten rid of, just stinging her, all the time, to induce insanity you see), meeting the titan Prometheus and swimming across a whole fucking ocean (as a human that's tough, as a cow...yeah). But it was all worth it because in the end Zeus had his way and she ended up giving birth to some of Zeus' kids (sure, he had given up on her, but Zeus is Zeus), who then had kids of their own, who then had kids with other Zeus babies because looking at the family tree of ancient greeks myths is a lot like reading a rednecks family tree (oh my mother is my brother, is my fathers aunties uncle, is my grandpa, is my nephew is my son! and so on, seriously, zeus hit up his own grandchildren multiple times, who then procreated with each other, and don't even get me started on Herakles and the Danaids, 1 Zeus male descendant, 50 Zeus female descendants, and all 50 were impregnated, and then started marrying each other, and all the ancient greek rulers pointed at shit like this and was like "we is descended from this union, this is why we're more specialler than you!" and you know, they weren't wrong)....
....anyway, where was I...oh yes, the moral. I guess the moral of this story is don't trust Zeus. If you're a woman, he'll probably turn you into some kind of animal...and then fuck you....or turn himself into an animal...and fuck you...either way, he's going to fuck you. If you're a male, don't get in the way or he will have you killed...and then probably fuck you.
Hera though, being that she was the Queen of the gods and also, you know, knowing what Zeus was like, was suspicious when she found her husband with his arms wrapped around a cow and so, using her wit, proclaimed "Oh, what a fabulous gift you've got for me there, I've always wanted a cow!" and Zeus was forced to give over poor Io to Hera.
However, thinking quickly, Zeus burst out "Ah, but we live on Mount Olympus, can't take cows up a mountain, they're very terrestrial, scared of heights, don't you know."
Hera conceded the point but insisted that the cow be kept in her sacred olive grove (somehow not a euphemism) and watched over by her friend, Argos, who was a giant with like, so many eyes, just, freaking, so many, it was weird. Hera knew that loyal Argos would keep an eye (or two, or fifty, or a hundred) on Io at all times because he never closed them all at once.
However, she had not banked on Hermes, who Zeus sent to kill Argos because that's the logical reaction to being cockblocked by your wife. Send your son to kill her friend. Anyway, Hermes went there and tried to get Argos to leave the cow unattended, but no matter what he did he couldn't get the giant to close all his eyes at the same time. He tried spells and hexes, he tried playing soothing lullabies on his lyre, nothing would work until he started spouting on about the history of musical instruments ("Hey, did I ever tell you how I made the first lyre? First, I got this turtle right...." and on he goes, oy) which knocked the giant out. Then, Hermes lopped Argos' head off with a sickle because fucker was hardcore.
As it turns out, Zeus had kind of moved on by this point and didn't really care anymore. He went off to do Zeus things. Argos' eyes got put on peacock tails because they were Hera's favourite bird. Hermes got no comeuppance. And as for Io, well, she eventually got turned back into a human, after being cursed by Hera to madness by gadfly (just one, that couldn't be gotten rid of, just stinging her, all the time, to induce insanity you see), meeting the titan Prometheus and swimming across a whole fucking ocean (as a human that's tough, as a cow...yeah). But it was all worth it because in the end Zeus had his way and she ended up giving birth to some of Zeus' kids (sure, he had given up on her, but Zeus is Zeus), who then had kids of their own, who then had kids with other Zeus babies because looking at the family tree of ancient greeks myths is a lot like reading a rednecks family tree (oh my mother is my brother, is my fathers aunties uncle, is my grandpa, is my nephew is my son! and so on, seriously, zeus hit up his own grandchildren multiple times, who then procreated with each other, and don't even get me started on Herakles and the Danaids, 1 Zeus male descendant, 50 Zeus female descendants, and all 50 were impregnated, and then started marrying each other, and all the ancient greek rulers pointed at shit like this and was like "we is descended from this union, this is why we're more specialler than you!" and you know, they weren't wrong)....
....anyway, where was I...oh yes, the moral. I guess the moral of this story is don't trust Zeus. If you're a woman, he'll probably turn you into some kind of animal...and then fuck you....or turn himself into an animal...and fuck you...either way, he's going to fuck you. If you're a male, don't get in the way or he will have you killed...and then probably fuck you.
Voices
When I was a kid I used to do these voice imitation things. Like, I'd put on different accents, imitate celebrity voices or whatever. One time, I went about a week or so changing my voice every day. I'd spend one day speaking in a cockney accent all day, the next, an Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation, the next I'd do a hoarse Glaswegian voice. Anyway, it got to the point where I forgot what my actual voice sounded like. Have you ever had that? It's a surreal moment of depersonalisation. It was kind of like that thing people get when they hear themselves on a recording, the "do I really sound like that?" moment where they're not entirely certain it's them because they're hearing their own voices without the differing timbre and such created by their own skulls. It was like that but taken to the extreme. "Do I really sound like that? Hang on, what do I actually sound like?"
It was genuinely terrifying, like losing a piece of the self, or rather, not knowing it at all. Never told anyone about it either, never wrote it down anywhere, but people (randomers as well as family and friends of) would always say that I don't sound like I'm from Liverpool (sadly, I do sound more Scouse now, which is a shame as I cannot stand that fucking accent...thinking on it, probably some psychosomatic thing that caused the change in voice in the first place...hmm) and of course, that just fueled the fear that I had done something to my voice. That it wasn't *my* voice, if that makes sense.
It was genuinely terrifying, like losing a piece of the self, or rather, not knowing it at all. Never told anyone about it either, never wrote it down anywhere, but people (randomers as well as family and friends of) would always say that I don't sound like I'm from Liverpool (sadly, I do sound more Scouse now, which is a shame as I cannot stand that fucking accent...thinking on it, probably some psychosomatic thing that caused the change in voice in the first place...hmm) and of course, that just fueled the fear that I had done something to my voice. That it wasn't *my* voice, if that makes sense.
Wednesday, 10 December 2014
Lucky Chloe
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4O0UphHT6uE/maxresdefault.jpg
This is Lucky Chloe. She is a new character in the fighting series Tekken, joining the roster when Tekken 7 releases. Except maybe not (at least in America) because of the fans outraged at the idea of a cute character in their grimdark serious fighting game series (the same series that has characters such as: http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120821020820/tekken/en/images/7/7d/Alisa_Bosconovitch_TTT2.png a literal robotic schoolgirl, http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110830171938/tekken/en/images/c/c4/Gon_-_Full-body_CG_Art_Image_-_Tekken_3.png a tie in promotion chibi dinosaur, and many more...I've also got to include this scene http://s1.dmcdn.net/UyHV.jpg because it's the badass main character of the series being made to wear a thong...serious bidness!).
Reading through the comment sections on various sites (listed at the end of this missive)the outrage runs the gamut from the aforementioned "you can't put this in my fighting game!" to "screw them for appealing to the popular vocaloid crowd" to "this character is oppressive to females and only reinforces stereotypes!" to which I say...fucking shut up! The arguments seem different but they all boil down to the same basic point, "I feel undue privilege, give me what I want or I will scream."
Your fighting game? No sir/madam, it's the makers (Harada's) game. He could make the game's roster consist of nothing but Lucky Chloe reskins and it would be perfectly fine because it is "his" (well, his teams, but he's the boss so) game.
'It's just to appeal to Vocaloid fans', yes, and? Vocaloids fairly big in Japan but, hmm, lets think about this, a Japanese game trying to appeal to a Japanese audience...there might actually be something in this one...except the outrage is justified because...what? It's not targeted at you? Get the fuck out.
And lastly, my favourite, the "this character is oppressive to females" blather. This one I love most of all because it's so utterly hypocritical, basically "you can't tell women how to act or dress, only I (and people like me) can!". Add in some casual racism (as tends to be the case with these people commenting) along the lines of "Japan needs to start acting more like us civilised people in the West" and you have to laugh if only to curb the murderous rage now burning within.
Anyway, to end this (not really focussed tirade), here's a picture based on the Tekken character designer Harada's tweet saying he'd make a big, burly man character to appease the offended inclusionary folk.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B4d63E6IAAARLeb.png:large
Bless that man.
- Outraged points of view were taken from Gamespot, Polygon, Ign and Eurogamer website comment sections. (The reports themselves were about the outrage)
This is Lucky Chloe. She is a new character in the fighting series Tekken, joining the roster when Tekken 7 releases. Except maybe not (at least in America) because of the fans outraged at the idea of a cute character in their grimdark serious fighting game series (the same series that has characters such as: http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120821020820/tekken/en/images/7/7d/Alisa_Bosconovitch_TTT2.png a literal robotic schoolgirl, http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110830171938/tekken/en/images/c/c4/Gon_-_Full-body_CG_Art_Image_-_Tekken_3.png a tie in promotion chibi dinosaur, and many more...I've also got to include this scene http://s1.dmcdn.net/UyHV.jpg because it's the badass main character of the series being made to wear a thong...serious bidness!).
Reading through the comment sections on various sites (listed at the end of this missive)the outrage runs the gamut from the aforementioned "you can't put this in my fighting game!" to "screw them for appealing to the popular vocaloid crowd" to "this character is oppressive to females and only reinforces stereotypes!" to which I say...fucking shut up! The arguments seem different but they all boil down to the same basic point, "I feel undue privilege, give me what I want or I will scream."
Your fighting game? No sir/madam, it's the makers (Harada's) game. He could make the game's roster consist of nothing but Lucky Chloe reskins and it would be perfectly fine because it is "his" (well, his teams, but he's the boss so) game.
'It's just to appeal to Vocaloid fans', yes, and? Vocaloids fairly big in Japan but, hmm, lets think about this, a Japanese game trying to appeal to a Japanese audience...there might actually be something in this one...except the outrage is justified because...what? It's not targeted at you? Get the fuck out.
And lastly, my favourite, the "this character is oppressive to females" blather. This one I love most of all because it's so utterly hypocritical, basically "you can't tell women how to act or dress, only I (and people like me) can!". Add in some casual racism (as tends to be the case with these people commenting) along the lines of "Japan needs to start acting more like us civilised people in the West" and you have to laugh if only to curb the murderous rage now burning within.
Anyway, to end this (not really focussed tirade), here's a picture based on the Tekken character designer Harada's tweet saying he'd make a big, burly man character to appease the offended inclusionary folk.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B4d63E6IAAARLeb.png:large
Bless that man.
- Outraged points of view were taken from Gamespot, Polygon, Ign and Eurogamer website comment sections. (The reports themselves were about the outrage)
Tuesday, 7 October 2014
Gamergate
I've pretty much stayed out of this whole gamergate thing, I think I've talked about it with maybe two other people and it was like a five minute "yeah, it's pretty bullshit, can understand both sides, blah blah blah" thing but yeah, my ire has slowly been rising...the first photo linked is from the xoxo festival of last year, the second is of this year. We'll get back to that in just a tick.
Brief notes for those who don't know anything about gamergate, it started when the ex-boyfriend of a female indie game developer accused her of sleeping with a games journalist to get her product a better rating. This might not be entirely true (or at the least is unprovable, though it is a fact that the two accused started dating the day after the review came out which is fairly suspicious in itself though not at all any indication of guilt).This accusation of (note well) of falsifying journalistic endeavour led to a massive backlash against gamers by a group of people who said that such wild claims were examples of the rampant misogyny and lack of diversity in gaming as a whole, the general view being that the male gamer was upset that his hobby was being usurped by emergent female gamers, whilst female gamers in support of such males were falling victim to institutional gender bias (somehow).
Gamers argue it's not about misogyny or being upset about more/less diversity in games (which is a contestable point anyway), but rather that it's about the lack of oversight these games journalists have, that, in effect, these journalists are free to write whatever they want, however they want and receive whatever they want in the forms of free games, merch, etc. and never be held to account for it and that leads to unmitigated corruption with the medium itself.
That is a very, very brief summation of what has transpired thus far in the whole sorry saga. Why I linked those two pictures though is because they are pictures of the XoXo festival, a festival that claims to highlight and support diversity and independence in art and technology. It's all about diversity, right? That's what it claims? Now count how many of the people there that are NOT white, 20ish, males. If you cannot count without using your fingers, don't worry, you won't run out of fingers, hell, if i say take away the white women from that NOT list, you'd probably only need the one hand to count the rest. That's not a diverse crowd. That's a group of people, a very large group of people, who want to sound as though they support diversity because it's the "moral" thing to say. Oh aren't we good because we say good things.
Now compare that audience of people made up of those bemoaning the lack of diversity in gaming with:
There's still an overabundance of males in both pictures, yes, but compared to the ones at the diversity symposium? The second picture was from League of Legends, a game with a reputation for a terrifying toxic environment, so toxic in fact, its developers had to implement ways to curtail player interaction because it was damaging the title...and yet still, there's asians, there's africans/african-americans, there's white folk, male, female, all there having a good time, but it's gamers who have the inability to diversify/cope with diversity? And yet, instead of looking at the quote/unquote journalists attacking people who were attacking them (not as people, but as journalists), other media picked up on it and were heavily sympathetic to the plight of the poor women so traumatised by this event. Which is why women like Zoe Quinn (which I should've mentioned at the start was the woman who started this whole furore) and Anita Sarkeesian are getting articles in places such as cracked.com, polygon.com, even british tabloids like the guardian (oh sorry, it's a broadsheet, snicker snicker) where they talk about their plight and what they've had to suffer through, because they have suffered, that is without question, they've been attacked, time and again. Not because they are women but because what they purport as truth is anything but. Anita Sarkeesian in particular has made a living out of being a victim, it's actually quite masterful, because there'll always be a pack of moral activists willing to jump on the lance pointed at her lies when she screams "misogyny!"
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that gaming is this great, all inclusive thing, because it patently isn't, but as hobbies go it's definitely got a fair leg up on most of its competitors, and for it to be attacked and slandered in such a way is sad, most of all. Not because I like gaming (though I do, a whole freaking lot), but because of what attacking it without thought shows our society to be. The observation I take from it (and other things like this) is that there are far too many people who are far too interested in looking and appearing correct and moral than actually being correct and moral.
Anyway, I've bored you all long enough now, go have an ice cream and/or carbonated beverage of your choosing.
Friday, 18 July 2014
Frozen Iron
Do you wanna build an Iron man? Come on, lets go and save the day! I never see you anymore, come out the door, it's like you lost your way! We used to be avengers, and now we're not, I wish you'd tell me why...do you wanna build an Iron man....it doesn't have to be an Iron man....
Do you wanna build an Iron man? Or ride around our flash new cars, i think some company is overdue, I've started talking to that AI you've got hidden in your walls!
It gets a little lonely, saving a world from certain doom, just watching as the foes fly by....
Tony, please I know you're in there, people are asking where you've been, put down the dutch courage, i know you're trying to, we're right out here for you, just let us in....
Us avengers only have each other, it's just us and Nick Fury, what are we going to do....
Do you wanna build an Iron man....
Do you wanna build an Iron man? Or ride around our flash new cars, i think some company is overdue, I've started talking to that AI you've got hidden in your walls!
It gets a little lonely, saving a world from certain doom, just watching as the foes fly by....
Tony, please I know you're in there, people are asking where you've been, put down the dutch courage, i know you're trying to, we're right out here for you, just let us in....
Us avengers only have each other, it's just us and Nick Fury, what are we going to do....
Do you wanna build an Iron man....
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