A look-see through 2004

2004: The year of the war-hungry, disaster-prone snake who everyone likes (apparently)
Well, just a couple of hours until 2005 leaps upon us. It’s been an eventful year (like every other year). So what better way to segue out 2004 by writing an analysis of the moments that made us feel things? Well, there’s partying, fireworks, getting hammered, getting together with friends, and so on, but I’ve got bugger all plans, so I’ll go the 42^nd best option.

However, for no real reason, I’ll stay away from tackling the real issues. If you want politics, terrorism and celebrity break-ups, go anywhere else. It feels like every Tom, Dick and Harry wants to pitch in their 2 cents to the debate (or their $50 notes to various charities). But stick around, and you’ll get the hard opinions on:

Music
It’s been a mixed year in terms of the muzak that is asphyxiating our airwaves and CD shops. There have been a lot of goodies, but there has also been an unfortunate uprising of one of the most hideous genres of music. That’s right, wuss rock. We’ve been flooded with this curse, from the crap provided by Hobbastank, to the shonk dished out by Simple Plan [shudder]. Thankfully, most of these bands have failed miserably. When was the last time you heard a second single from Star Sailor or the Ramsus? Unfortunately, the likes of Good Charlotte and Blink 182 (the new depressing punk, not the good stuff they’ve previously done) still exist.

Movies
The stuff on the silver screen, fortunately, has proved much more satisfying than the radio. It has been, inevitably, the year of the documentary, with nearly one documentary released for every two or so feature films.
Some of the top flicks (in my opinion) included: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Shrek 2, Super Size Me, Bad Santa, Shaun of the Dead, and The Incredibles.
Then there are the absolute stinkers, which included: Once Upon A Time In Mexico, Somersault, Taxi (the trailer and plot alone puts this one in the list), and (to a lesser extent) Hellboy.

Well, that’s my view of 2004. Quite empty, isn’t it? But think about it. Who can be stuffed typing a post for a blog on a hot summer night, let alone on New Year’s Eve?

Anyway, have a shiny 2005.

Corporate X-mas: Deleted scene

Because everyone seems to look forward to these on their DVDs, and because I'm a cheap bastard who has to give. Enjoy.
CEO (Santa): …And for those long-winded reasons, next year, my uniform and sleigh will retain the signature Red colour scheme. Anyways, on to more important issues at hand. Manufacturing division, your report, please.
Head of Manufacturing (Elf #42925 Jr.): This year has been very successful for North Pole Enterprises. We have been able to, if you will, kill two birds with one stone.
Santa: Please don’t mention birds or any other edible animal, please. I can’t get off this vegan diet my doctor has force-fed on to me. Those darn kids with their milk and cookies. Each year, I try to resist. But who can resist milk and cookies!? Thanks to that bloody stereotype, I’m not allowed to eat anything that even remotely tastes goo -
[Awkward silence as Santa becomes aware of the strange looks from the board]
Santa (cont.): Sorry. I kind of digressed there for a second. Anyway, please continue number four-two-nine-two-five.
Elf #42925 Jr.: Thank you, sir. Anyway, last year, we had two major problems to overcome. According to accounts, we needed to reduce costs or we would end up broke in the next couple of years. But at the same time, the elf unions demanded higher wages. (To self: Yet you wouldn’t pay up, cheap bastard)
Santa: What’d you say?
Elf #42925 Jr.: Nothing, nothing at all. (ahem) Like I was saying, we’ve solved all of these problems. Around February, North Pole Enterprises were able to acquire a toy manufacturing factory in China. Wage costs alone in those sweatshops are about a third of what we used to pay to the elves.
Unfortunately, this has left many, many elves homeless, forced to live in shoddily built snow caves.
Vice President (Dixen): Don’t worry about that. We’ve made a deal with the North Pole Crisis Squad to end their suffering.
Elf #42925 Jr.: How, may I ask? Food, shelter, guns? What?
Dixen: By giving each and every stranded elf a million candy canes(!) By eliminating them, of course!
[Awkward silence]
Elf #42925 Jr.: You Bastard. You Sick Bastard! I’ve had it up to here [Raises hand about 72cm off the ground] with your evil dictatorship. It was the only way to provide for my family. But now, you’ve gone too far! I’ll kill you! I swear on Donna’s grave I’ll kill you! All of you!
Dixen: Hey, my sister is still alive, short stuff. You can look me in the shins and insult me, but if you dare mention my family-
Elf #42925 Jr.: [Pulls out pistol] Screw you and all!
Santa: [Into intercom] Security.
[Bang]

[A few minutes later]
Santa: Okay then. [Wipes blood off beard into red uniform] Sorry about that…diversion. Let's move onto Public Relations.
[Stretcher carrying corpse bumps into a door, breaking the tension]

A very corporate Christmas

You better watch out. You better not cry. You better not pout. I'm telling you why. Santa Corp is coming to town.
(North Pole Enterprises. Board meting: 7th day of Christmas)

CEO (Santa): …And for those long-winded reasons, next year, my uniform and sleigh will retain the signature Red colour scheme. Anyways, on to more important issues at hand. Manufacturing division, your report, please.
Head of Manufacturing (Elf #42925 Jr.): This year has been very successful for North Pole Enterprises. We have been able to, if you will, kill two birds with one stone.
Santa: Please don’t mention birds or any other edible animal, please. I can’t get off this vegan diet my doctor has force-fed on to me. Those darn kids with their milk and cookies. Each year, I try to resist. But who can resist milk and cookies!? Thanks to that bloody stereotype, I’m not allowed to eat anything that even remotely tastes goo -
[Awkward silence as Santa becomes aware of the strange looks from the board]
Santa (cont.): Sorry. I kind of digressed there for a second. Anyway, please continue number four-two-nine-two-five.
Elf #42925 Jr.: Thank you, sir. Anyway, last year, we had two major problems to overcome. According to accounts, we needed to reduce costs or we would end up broke in the next couple of years. But at the same time, the elf unions demanded higher wages
Fortunately, we’ve solved all of these problems. Around February, North Pole Enterprises were able to acquire a toy manufacturing factory in China. Wage costs alone in those sweatshops are about a third of what we used to pay to the elves. Thanks to this, I’ve heard that profits are up five-fold.
Santa: That’s excellent news. Let’s hope this trend continues as we move on to Public Relations.
Head of Public Relations (Rudolf): PR, as you know, is all about increasing the belief that people hold in our cause. This belief is the main selling point to all our investors. Super Fun Happy Toy Incorporated alone bought an extra 0.7% stake of North Pole Enterprises based on last year’s increase in belief units.
We have had an increase in belief units for this year, but it isn’t as high as we anticipated. The main cause for this lower than expected result is due to the unexpected failure of this year’s propaganda device.
Santa: You mean ‘Choo-Choo Train to Santaland’, that film we spent $40 million on, $10 million of that on that famous actor, Joe Pascipade?
Rudolf: Yes, that one. Despite Mr. Pascipade voicing many of the characters, it failed to hit the adult demographic as hard as it could. And the subliminal messages we planted basically flew over the kids’ heads.
Santa: But those scumbags still got the basic message, right?
Rudolf: Yes, sir, they did. But only at about half the potential.
Santa: Well you better do something better next year. Or your nose won’t be the only thing that’s red. While you’re at it, remind me later to add this Pascipade to the naughty list.
Rudolf: Yessir.
Santa: Okay, Mr. Santa Deployment head, give me the rundown.
Vice-head of Santa Deployment (Bing Bowie): This year, like every year before it, went nearly without a hitch. All the necessary people were trained in our Santa Duplicate Academy, passed with flying colours, and were deployed to the appropriate areas. Additionally, testing for our planned Christmas Cynics Brainwashing Program have yielded good results.
Santa: What about this ‘nearly’ you mentioned at the start?
Bing Bowie: Umm, as usual, there were a couple of incidents where some punk teens stole the duplicates’ fake beards. [beat] But also, you second cousin in Iceland caused some problems. Apparently, one family was dissatisfied with their holiday there. They went on the news about it, and the rest is, well, sensationalist history.
Santa: For the love of...Why am I not surprised that he was involved in this. We might have to get another intervention and AA team on him.
Look, I’ve had enough bad news for now. Let’s take a break. We resume in one hour.
[The rest of the board leaves except for one]
Santa: So, how did your division go?
Head of discreet operations (Juan): Everything is going as planned. We’ve been distributing copies of the standard Christmas conversion projects, ‘Miracle on 34^th Street’ and ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’, to various non-believers. That’s why PR reported that growth.
Santa: And…
Juan: Yes. And we’ve managed to extract some more immortality elixir. You’ll be doing your thing for yet another year.
Santa: Very good. You can go now.
[Juan leaves. Santa leans back on chair and sighs]
Santa: Why did I let them make me change Christmas to this whole corporate bullshit? Christmas Spirit my fat, saggy arse.

and on that rather optimistic note, have a very merry Christmas. watch this space for a special present.

A half-decent nerd tale

The disturbing, ranting adventure of a person who walks into a shop and spends...
$74.84. That's how much I spent on a video game. I actually wanted to spend this amount of money, almost half my fortnightly wage, on the game Half-Life 2. This may look like a dramatic step towards nerdism. Luckily, I waited about a week or two before I got the game. No midnight openings for me. Besides, being surrounded by a horde of nerds is...disturbing for an antisocialite like me.
(Posting a post about this game seems like an even bigger step towards nerdism. However, I'm very bored, and the idea of having an Olympics 'joke' as the most recent post doesn't seem too good. Who says that I'm not topical?)
Anyway, two hours after installing the game, after the process that I had to go through to activate the game, I finally got to play. Two hours later, ironically, I can't play the game. Not because I've finished it, but because I'm scared of the game.
That's right. I'm afraid of a video game.
Call me crazy (on top of Antisocial, elitist, time-consuming, and a frequent poster), but the little enemies in that game just give me the creeps. These little black, spider-like aliens have stopped me from playing this game. Isn't this great. I paid $74.84 for a game that I can't play.

Luckily, the 5 CD set came with another game: Counter-Strike Source. An updated version of the online game that has spawned a generation of nasal, smelly nerds (they do have their own smell, like an old person has that smell of geriatricity and mothballs), and even has caused a murder (Apparently, someone was killed by someone else who dressed up in a CS costume).
As it's school holidays, and as I've got Way too much time on my hands (hence this weblog), I decided to give the game a go.
This game is an experience. Not because of the game play, but because of its players. Being the shite player I am, I got to watch the other players play and converse with each other. And let me tell you, it ain't healthy. I've seen more maturity in a group of year 7 and 8 kids. These nerds do nothing but insult each other, throwing insults ("ur gay". "no, ur gy". "no, im not". "yes u r". etc.) and accusations ("HaXoR. Ban the gay HaXoR). I have no idea what the last one means, by the way. It just seems like an insult.
Not to mention what happens when someone brings up technology. I've seen games come to a complete stop as the other players have conversations and 'civilised' debates about video cards. These nerds are very elitist on this topic. I mentioned that I have a Geforce 2 (a rather outdated video card), and everyone pounced on me like geeky vultures on a Playboy magazine. For a good 5 minutes, nerds on their microphones were laughing at me and calling me weird things that I can't remember and understand.
One more tale to bore you all. Whilst playing, a female voice appears among their drone of nerdy, male voices. Immediately after this message was broadcast, society went flying out the window. "omg. r u a grl?". "a girl on cs?". And so on, and so forth. There are girls all over the place. Who cares if there's one playing a video game?

Well, its back to my $74.84 investment. Time to not play a game, and be surrounded by immature, girl-fearing, nasal-voiced nerds.

(I realise the irony of complaining of nerds and playing a nerdish-type game at the same time. So don't bother making a scene out of it)