How do you define the purpose of something that has NO purpose?

I have to do a specification for the game that I am programming at college. As you may have already learnt, I am appalling at programming, so this is quite a challenge. The following specification is the one that I would love to be able to submit. I really have no idea how I'm supposed to write a purpose for a game, since the reason why people play games is because they have no purpose.
I've written the actual specification which includes massive straw grasping, but here is the one that I would love to have submitted in its place.




Purpose (~100)

I have made this game because I have to. I don't especially want to, and I'm not especially good at it. That doesn't exactly explain the purpose, but I do kind of hope that this game is such a solid choice that it would survive a nuclear apocalypse and provide extreme and prolonged entertainment of the survived and mutilated humanity that remains. Perhaps in a similar circumstance to Fallout 3, by Bethesda.

Description (~400)

The game [Breakout] was originally developed by Atari in 1976. It was influenced by the earlier game, Pong, also by Atari, which is fitting, because I own an Atari t-shirt. I nearly wore it today, but instead settled for my high collar polo.
The game itself consists of rows of ‘bricks’ that occupy the majority of the players screen that must be ‘broken’ by a square that can be bounced from a paddle to keep the square in motion.

If the square was to miss the paddle then the player would lose a ‘life’ but they would generally have already lost their lives by playing this game in the first place.
I know right? Seriously advanced for its time.

User Requirements (~300)

A single finger and an eye-ball. Could the user be stretched to a basic computer use ability? It's okay if they can't, we can always get somebody else to turn it on.

Target Audience (~200)
Anybody that can be bothered to be killed via boredom and extreme monotony.

Sit down, shut up, and listen to my weekend.

I have been uncharacteristically detached from the news this week, despite reading the papers and watching some news, I haven't really absorbed any of it to really take any notice or even have anything news worthy to tangibly speak about. Apparently Libyan rebels have 'captured' Gaddafi's home town [The Guardian], and 250,000 people had a march in London about cuts or something [The Telegraph]. The latter resulted in a minority of people predictably shooting themselves up to the eyeballs on testosterone and break a few windows. And again, for some reason, the Star thinks that a front page headline about Jordan is more important for people to know about than what is the domestic news  headlines this weekend; if anybody can be bothered to look up today's Star headline you would probably reel in disbelief. I hope poor Alex doesn't read it. Most papers have a political orientation, the Star has a celebrity orientation.

Oh, and apparently Michael Barrymore was booed off stage in a comedy comeback attempt [Mail Online]. The highly talented and respected individual, Daily Mail Reporter, publised this. Of course backed up with the usual onslaught of degrading and embarrasing photographs. Like this:



Did I do that properly?

Anyway, due to me presenting the absorbtion qualites of a wet sponge last week regarding the news, I find myself with nothing important to face you will other than to attempt to make you jealous at how packed full of jam that my weekend was.

Thursday and Friday night was punctuated with lovely midnight adventure walks with a friend who I spoken to properly for a while with her new dog. I use the word 'dog' lightly, it's an Old English Sheepdog puppy; that shows every bit of intellegence of your average Essex bimbo. Was still  nice to just blabber the toss about nothing in particular in the darkness of the night.

Saturday's dull starchy sustinance was work. But it was polite to fly over and with the one bliddy time that I actually arranged to meet somebody outside the doors after my shift, is the one time where management decided to keep us all back 30 minutes to tidy the mess that was left by lazy, ignorant and stupid customers whom seemingly fail to possess the simply ability to hang something back up properly. So yeah, me and The Persistance of Memory eventually met, and under the false pretence of having a pint at the pub, the deceptive shit brought another one of our mates along and we ended up going to see a Faith No More tribute band, Faith No Man. Apparently this was what was planned all along, she did well to keep it from me. But then I have been mincing around in my own little bubble of late, so that probably is more my fault.

Faith No More were a pretty damn decent band back in the day, and this tribute band went a long way to doing them justice. Despite only knowing 'Epic' and vaguely recognising 'Falling to Pieces' from Black Hawk Down (I told you that it was in that film, guys)  I was severly impressed at how well they played. Good vocal work, and some pretty nifty finger work from the bassest and guitarist brought through the vibes of the classic rock band nicely. Furthermore, the drummer managed to flawlessly beat out the puccussion with enough politeness to vibrate the bones you stood with. One thing I would like to point out, would be that the keyboard player seemed to be there just for show half the time.

Bumped into a couple of people of whom I hadn't seen for a while, one of which I was really hoping I hadn't, but fortunately, it was only in passing. But the night was remembered by the absolute legend of a DJ that put on a whole host of songs so old-school my Gran would've been happy pulling some shapes to them - Jackson 5, that's right.

Didn't actually get around to going to sleep until 4.30am- I mean, 5.30am. The clocks went forward, did I mention that? I didn't know for sure until the Taxi driver confirmed it.

Sunday was easily one of the worst days of work in my life (so far), but I did buy a funky new shirt and a banging Thomas The Tank Engine cap for the bairn because he's suddenly developed a well placed love for the little blue engine, just like his daddy when I was his age.

So that's my blog about the key news events of the past week. You know when you've been informed. Thank you and until next time.

Waging a crusading war of Hitlerism!




Loyalist tanks attacked

Watching eagerly how the events are unfolding in Libya, it would seem that last Friday, the UN finally made the decision to sanction the No-Fly-Zone over Gaddafi's plot of North African sand. This all came together on Saturday when the French for once actually took some military action and lead the assault on the country by launching an air mission against Gaddafi loyalists whom were carrying out an assault on the rebel held city of Benghazi - which, it would seem, has perturbed the Americans because an attack on ground forced themselves apparently lacked international approval. This opening hand was then followed up by a huge salvo of 112 cruise missiles from US warships and a British submarine on Libyan anti-air and command infrastructure. These opening attacks were then chased by a 3000 mile round trip from Norfolk by British Tornados on a sortie on yet more of Gaddafi's anti-air network. Needless to say, despite being at work, I don't think I have watched rolling news this avidly since the Coalition invation of Iraq in 2001.

It would seem that the UN backed No-Fly-Zone is already facing small amounts of criticism from the Arab League, and it would appear that China and Russia are beginning to regret their decision to not veto on Friday. This however this is drowned out by the sound of the bombs and the thankful voice of all the anti-Gaddafi supporters in Libya and around the world.

Muammar Gaddafi

What is perhaps the most curious aspect of this whole situation is the propaganda campaign that is being waged by the Libyan government. The vast majority of it really is so bad, it is just comical to believe that anybody would be indoctrinated by it; but when twined with the air missions from the coalition, Gaddafi loyalists do seem to be influenced by it. I mean, it is understandable for the government to be trying to keep Libyans onside, but when he's piping up with crap like "this is an unjustified aggression" and calling the UN coalition "terrorists", I honestly don't understand how he is going to be able to keep up his rhetoric for much longer. Gaddafi, do us all a favour, ressurect Goebbels and ask him to teach you how to do propaganda properly. Oh, accutually, forget that. It's us that are waging a "crusading" campaign of "Hitlerism" - you can't have him.

I know it may sound a little arrogant to scoff at the propaganda being spread, but does Gaddafi seriously think that he stands even an iota of a chance against two of the most experienced and biggest military mights in the world? He has even called us the "Coalition of the devil".

America and the UK haven't yet ruled out the possibility of a deployment of ground forces onto Libyan soil, and Cameron is discussing the whole situation in parliament as we speak. How that and the rest of this 'conflict' turns out will be firmly in the hands of the powers that be, and how they are willing to react to each others actions.

Now this is need-to-know world news.

Yeah, forget the tragedy that is unravelling in Japan right now, a Gypsy 'war' in Manchester is what the Daily Star thinks that the British public are far more interested in right now. This quite frankly disgusting piece of journalism is well on par with the Daily Mail's spectacle of a few days ago. Does the Star's questionable PR department (if it even has one) even think about how its paper would look when displayed with the other papers of the day? Because to be frank, when I saw this lined up with the other tabloids such as The Sun and the Daily Mail, it just looked so ignorant to have a small subline regarding to the Japan tragedy, that doesn't even refer to Japan; only mentioning that 4,000 Brits have apparently died in a quake. Which one? New Zealand? Haiti?

Funnily enough, low and behold, in the matter of seconds I spent stewing and contemplating my annoyance, your typical Daily Star reader stereotype picked up a copy and bought it. The sort of person you expect to see in the Black Garter in Newcastle's Granger Market - Grunting for communication whilst hydrating and sustaining himself on pork scratchings, peanuts and Special Brew. 

Honestly, I didn't bother actually reading past the front page; the idea of physical contact with the disappointing tree by-product wasn't appealing to me.

It isn't like this is something that this tabloid looks at occasionally, the past half month's front pages have been literally plagued by 'news' such as this, and Jordan - oh, and that Muslim's are a disgrace. 

I'm a fan of the free press, but it has to have its boundaries when aspects of the media are publishing hate educing and racist stories? It only leads to increased ignorance, increased intolerance and increased fear throughout its uneducated, easily influenced reader base. To say that readers of the Star have the intelligence of a slug, is disrespectful to the slug.

And now for something completely different.

They get up at the same time.
Carry out their well oiled - well worn routine.
Partake the same wait for the same bus.
The bus comes. The train comes. The same fare. The same faces.
Same route.
The same journey. Only thing that changes is the air.

Occasionally something is different; snow perhaps. But that only grips them briefly.
They still arrive at the office in the same suits. Through the same door. To the same desks.
To the same job.

They carry out their tasks over the low murmur of the ambience; spiking with a burst of laughter.
Minds dare to wonder to more exotic jobs, full of excitement:
Playing with lions, studying volcanoes, racing driver.
Where did they go wrong?

Lunch comes. Same sandwich shop, same menu. They know what they want, but they still glance over the menu,
Full of interesting flavours: Tikka, Corination, Prawn.
"Ham sandwich, please." "Anything else?"
"A bottle of wine too."
But they dare not say it, and stick with Diet Cola.

Back to the desk. Same as the morning.

They carry out their tasks over the low murmur of the ambience; spiking with a burst of laughter.

Minds dare to wonder to more exotic jobs, full of excitement:

Playing with lions, studying volcanoes, racing driver. 

Where did they go wrong?

Home time.

From the same job. From the same desks. Back through the same door. In a creased suit.

Occasionally something is different; rain, perhaps. But it only grips them briefly.

Partake the same wait for the same bus. 

The bus comes. The train comes. The same fare. The same faces. 

Same route. 

The same journey. Only thing that changes is the air.

What happened to life? It used to be full of joy. Excitement.
Anticipation for the future.
Now they're in the future.
And they wish for the past.

William Hague: A blundering buffoon, cleverly disguised as a responsible person.

The beginning of this week saw the media headlines filled with articles titled with news of our SAS heroes' 'failure' and 'humiliation' in Libya. Here are just a few of these said headlines:

"SAS rounded up and booted out as Libyan mission turns to farce" - Daily Mail
"SAS-backed Libyan diplomatic mission ends in humiliation" - The Guardian
"Libya: SAS mission that began and ended in error" - The Telegraph

William Hague

From the outset, it would appear that it was our Special Forces that were solely to be put to blame here. Wrong. If one would invest a little time into reading a little further into the stories, it would turn out to be painstakingly obvious that it wasn't. It was in fact our superbly fantastical Foreign Secertary, William Hague. 
Yes, the SAS went in with weapons, fake passports and currency by method of a secret landing in the middle of the desert. But this is the SAS - their primary overseas roles are normally to win 'Hearts and Minds' of the locals. But they're in a potentially hostile environment,  you think they are going to just walk in with umbrellas, bowler hats and wearing pin-striped suits after asking for a letter of invitation?

So it would appear that the Conservative government have not only thrown away our telephones, gas, electric and train tracks, but our national pride in our special forces too. Granted, the planning of the mission could have been better, it was planned by the SAS; but this doesn't shy away from the fact that the Libyan rebels had openly stated that they didn't want western help at all. Therefore, Hague shouldn't have sanctioned the mission in the first place. Hague's ridiculous excuse was that it was a 'serious misunderstanding'. How can you misunderstand it when somebody clearly says, "We don't want your help." This was a mission that was clearly going to go south from the outset, no matter how it was planned. Mercifully, Hague had the sense to  admit that it was his stupid idea. But then said something about more plans being made for more 'diplomatic' missions into Eastern Libya. If they are any where near as diplomatic as the latest incident; I'm taking a trip to Downing Street myself and introducing some diplomacy to his stupid face, wrapped up in the parcel of my shoe.


Obviously, opposition MPs literally broke world high-jump records at the chance to slate this man who is so bold, that when he wears a Turtle Neck, he looks like Roll on Deodorant. Douglas Alexander, Shadow Foreign Secretary, asked if he would introduce himself to new neighbours 'by ringing the doorbell or instead choose to climb over the fence in the middle of the night'. Former Liberal - Democrat leader, Sir Menzies Campbell, said that it was 'ill concieved' and that Britain would have to 'restore' its reputation abroad. But by all means my favourite backlash that the Foreign Secretary received was the statement that British troops are being led by 'Tory ministers who have overdosed on James Bond'. There have been calls for William Hague to step down and resign - damn right should he, along with the rest of his blithering government. 

The late HMS Ark Royal

Do you remember a few months ago, back to when parliament were arguing about selling all our Harriers and our only Aircraft Carrier? Do you remember when they said that we don't need them anymore? The ironic thing here is that Iron Woman Thatcher said pretty much the same thing about our whole navy and decommissioned a lot of it back during her deluded and ideological reign of power - and then Argentina thought it would be funny to invade the Falklands. Now relate that to now; how handy would a carrier be right now to be able to sanction a No-Fly Zone over Libya if the UN give the go ahead.  Imagine if we had an offshore bit of kit that offers the sort of logistical support to quickly send aircraft in and out of an area where we don't have any military or civilian airport infrastructure so that we could extract vunerable British nationals with. 


It would seem that our Foreign Secretary is vastly incapable of his task of keeping up good relations with foreign states, and protecting our British nationals abroad. If this is the case, why the hell is he even in this position? How hard can it possibly be to approach British Airways and say "Here, guys, we've got a bunch of people who are stuck in a country that is falling to shit, we'll pay for you to send a few planes over to pick them up." Strewth, even I could do that, and I'm a stupid, lazy student. But at least on the plus side, Hague managed to get the most recent group of British Nationals out nice and speedily. 


I honestly have no idea what Hague was thinking. I mean, he's obviously as deluded as the rest of the Tory ministers that are proposing on moving May Day to October. This is because apparently in doing this, it would make the British tourism season longer, thus creating more revenue for the treasury. Bit of background info for you, May Day is "a day of political demonstrations and celebrations organised by the unions, communists, anarchists, and socialist groups". Of course the silly blue brained twits want to move it - change it's name and try and move it away from its modern meaning.


To be perfectly honest with you, I'm not exactly sure how doing this would accomplish this goal, since I seriously don't think the French or Spanish or Germans look at our calender and think, "Oh look! There's a bank holiday in England in October! Let's all fuck off over there for a couple of weeks and get rained on!". Furthermore, how does this counter the loss of the foreign tourism advertising budget? You know them nice, sunny, perfect looking adverts on telly yabbering on about how awesome New Zealand is (I mean was, it fell over recently), how stereotypical California is (until it falls over again) and how hot it is in Australia (coupled with the HUGE outdoor swimming pool they now have)? WE used to have them for other countries. Well, we did until Cameron said they cost too much and stopped their pocket money. 

Israel

Canada

Thailand

Something else that made some major news today was the issue of 'Sat-Nav Terrorism'. Well done free media. You've pulled a right doozie there. In an attempt to scare the masses into more of a sheltered existance away from technology, you've just told any potential terrorist that didn't know already all about how they can cause yet more havok. Spot on journalism righ' there. 


In more personal news, I am delighted to announce that I am up to Day 11 of being smoke free! I feel great, and I emplore anybody else who is thinking about quitting to do so. It's No Smoking Day tomorrow too (9/3/11) - What better excuse to kerb the habit?


I've also added some contact details on the bottom of this site if you have anything that you would like to contact me about; whether it's ideas on future rant- er, posts, or just want some advice on how to quit smoking - I'll be happy to hear from you. Unless you gonna' troll. Trolls can stay under their bridges, and Youtube. I also have an art blog! Just updated with some more work! 


NOTE: My sister blog has just written a review about the My Chemical Romance gig she attended the other week. It's a fantastic read if you're into that kind of music! 

Day 5 towards a smoke free life

This is day 5 of the latest one of my countless attempts to kick the habit of smoking. I have to say that this really isn't as hard as I thought it would be, nor how hard I remembered it to be. It may possibly be something to do with the sheer determination that I'm showing this time; even though I know deep down, I don't really want to quit.

Over the past 5 days it has given my brain time to think about how I can describe what it is like to a none smoker. Imagine breaking you leg or arm, it hurts like burning shit being smeared on the soles of your feet while having your eyes poked out with a blunt, but very hot pallet knife. It's not exactly how it feels to break a bone, but it's a similar pain level. Obviously, it doesn't physically hurt to have nicotine cravings, but for the sake of argument, just go along with it.
Anyway, imagine breaking your leg. It hurts loads to begin with, and then you go to the hospital and they strap it up and it doesn't hurt any more, it just aches. This is the same with quitting smoking. The first day or two are hell, the cravings come in their troves and you do all you can to stay sane. But after this first stage, the whole thing just retreats to the back of your mind, and like an annoying little child, will sit and repeat "IwannasmokeIwannasmokeIwannasmoke" all day. And just like with an annoying child, you learn to put up with it and not think about it. Of course this leads me to the major cravings that will breach every now and then - like a giant Sperm Whale does to breathe. These are like knocking your broken bone. It'll go from an inconsequential annoyance to a MASSIVE PAIN then back down to the former sensation again after a small (ish) wait.

Day 1 was utter hell. Me being stupid decided to smoke my last ciggy just moments before I started work. But with the knowledge of not being able to smoke when I finished my shift, all my stress levels rocketed the instant a customer showed any stupidity towards me.

"Where are the jeans?"
"Turn around, twat."

Of course, I didn't actually say that, but I thought it, and it showed with my stern and nippy responses to any query directed to me.

Day 2 was slightly better: work was much more relaxing than the day before. I'd managed the monumental effort of preparing myself mentally for the day ahead without my vice. But it ended with a mammoth craving that night that lasted about 2 or 3 hours, I actually came close to chewing off my face.

Day 3 was just a nightmare. First day back to college after half term, and poor poor Lewis took the whole lot of my angst straight in the face. Funny from an outside perspective, not so much for me. Or Lewis. But to his credit, he just took it. Like a boss.

Day 4 was lengthy. Because I was off college I spent the duration in my room waiting for Siobhan to finish university so I could go for a drink. I decided to try and make this wait as short as possible by literally laying in until 1.30 and then trying to keep myself busy. When the cravings did hit, they felt endless. Meeting up with Siobhan and putting the world to rights over a pint strangely didn't come with the by product of nicotine want, thankfully. Until upon exiting the staple institution of the English socialising medium (pub) I was full on walloped in the face by smoke fumes from those that were smoking on the doorstep. I found myself fighting the urge to drop to my knees and grovel for a cigarette from them. Of course I didn't do this. I have dignity.

Day 5. Well this is day 5, and rather peculiarly, I haven't had any major, MAJOR cravings - except from the odd one when I've seen another person indulging their habit. My mindset has also started to change towards smokers. I look at them differently, but I think this may just be bitterness because I want what they have in their hands and mouths (no, that was not an innuendo).

As of yet, I'm still not feeling the supposed health benefits that I should be, or the financial gains either. What ever I used to spend on sirs Lambert and Butler, just gets spent on other, equally pointless crap.

It matters not. Quitting is my goal, and quitting is what I'm going to do. Cold Turkey.