The Travails of being a Hero

I love comic books. If you don’t believe me, ask my Mum what happened the time she screwed up a Superman comic I was reading when I was supposed to be doing something less interesting (listening to her). Anyway, if you know me you are already aware of my comic love. If you don’t really know me but you’ve seen even like a photo of me you know this. My lips are almost permanently fixed in the “p-shew”

configuration as I pretend to fly to wherever I’m going. 

I would estimate that in my lifetime I have spent approximately six billion dollars on comic books.

I tell you this to establish just how mad I am for comics because I am about to ask you to consider how bad a game based entirely on comics would have to be for me to dislike it. I’m talking about DC Universe Online, a game seemingly made by people who love comics for people who hate comics. This seems like a strange conceptual angle and you could be forgiven for naively assuming that the crime against humanity that is DCUO might just be some kind of terrible misstep. But DCUO is so bad it can’t be a matter of simple error. This game is worse than the idea that when Superman’s home planet exploded and killed the entire populace a dog survived. A dog.

"Arf?" Real good survival skills.

 This game is the bad ideas equivalent of that dog. If all other bad ideas were ‘sploded into space, this game would stick around out of sheer bloody-minded annoyingness. Such horror cannot go unpunished. Someone fire up the bat signal!

Ben McDonough in the house again. 

We need the Batman’s assistance to put an end to this debacle. For every dreadful flaw displayed by DCUO, Batman will deliver one of his trademark staggering haymaker punches. It’s proven comic book science that nobody can stand up to any more than five punches from the Dark Knight. I think Batman even punched out a Tyrannosaurus Rex one time. He keeps it in the Batcave specifically so that Superman knows what time it is. So let’s see how long DCUO survives.

ROUND 1 – Buying the Game

So you’ve decided you want to buy DC Universe Online? That’s great! Before we go any further, here’s a thank you message from this year’s winner of the spastic thalidomide game design scholarship.

Buuuuuhh.

You’re helping to make their dreams come true. Of course, you know that paying $100 for that disc only entitles you to play the game for one month, right? Beyond that you need to pay a monthly subscription fee. In $NZ it’s about 30 bucks, the same amount of money you could use to buy an African kid (who could programme me a better game).

Luckily that original month’s access is about 29 days more than you need to play DCUO… and I got the game in February.

Punch!

ROUND 2 – Installing the Game

Worst alibi of all time: “What were you doing between the hours of 8:00 and 10:30 February the 1^st?”

“Watching DC Universe Online install, Officer.”

“That whole time?”

“Fucking… yes.”

“So you didn’t murder anyone.”

“No. I wanted to. But no.”

Install/load screens are never a good thing, but there are things you can do to make them more bearable. A static image of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Lex Luthor’s asses looking at a bunch of monitors like a goddamn superhero neighbourhood watch is not one of them. Seriously, that one picture spent so much time on my television that it was legally granted squatter’s rights.

"Batman hates squatters!"

ROUND 3 – TIME TO GET STARTED! OH… WAIT. NO IT’S NOT…

Because DCUO is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG in nerd shorthand) it’s expected that you’ll play with other people. Even though other people generally suck, this isn’t quite enough to justify a Batpunch, because it was the reason I bought the game myself. As I had next to no experience with MMORPGs, I figured one based on my secret dreams would be a good place to start. So my ichiban tomodachi Japan-living friend and I both ordered copies online. Here’s where it gets tricky.

We live in Japan.

We bought American copies of the game.

I have a New Zealand playstation account.

My friend has a UK playstation account.

This could go one of two ways: it could be a recipe for glorious internationalisation or, as the popular parlance goes, a ‘clusterfuck’. Care to hazard a guess?

DC’s premier superteam is the JLA – the Justice League of America. Do you know what they don’t have in the JLA? New Zealanders. Also Brits. Turns out the game disc is just as racist as the JLA, forcing us to create fraudulent American playstation network accounts just to play a game that clearly hates us and our descendants.

"Are you an American breed? Or a terrorist?!"

ROUND 4 – TIME TO GET STARTED FOR REAL!

Once all that bullshit is over with, it’s time to actually do some gaming on what has up until this point been a spiteful three-figure paperweight. DCUO opens with a sweet cinematic that depicts all kinds of famous DC super-powered folk getting shot, stabbed or just punched to death. The movie ends with Lex Luthor realising that some of these corpses will be needed to repel an alien invasion, so he (fairly flippantly, I must say) travels back in time to prevent it from happening.

I’m not even being sarcastic, this movie is the best part of the game. It’s like the game’s makers realise that you’re only hanging on by a thread at this point. If they had then rolled the end credits and said ‘thanks for playing’ I would have felt less ripped off than I do having played the hours of dross that follow. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Time travel back to the point!

The time travel plot is a canny move, because it became my only incentive to play on, trying to get back to the point where everyone gets horribly murdered again.

No punching?!?

ROUND 5 – MAKE ME A HERO

So you own the copyrights to let’s just say half of the world’s most recognisable superheroes and you’ve made a video game where players assume the role of a superhero. The first thing you have to do is crush the spirits of the vast majority of fans and lock out the ability to play as the Batman. I can understand that, otherwise you’ve got 28,000 Batmans running around, 21,500 Supermans and 1 Aquaman.

Awww...

Instead, in DCUO you can choose a costume “inspired” by the hero or villain that you wish they would just let you play. So if you favour Batman you will get something dark and creepy and invariably end up looking like some kind of gimp. If you prefer Wonder Woman, your costume will only cover half of each ass cheek. And so on. For some reason you can’t be inspired by Power Girl, even though she is an inspiration to everyone.

She has a 'prominent' role in in-game loading screens.

Hilariously, this method just meant that I saw a lot of ‘Spiderguy’ and ‘Wolver1ne’ characters running around the game world.

For my character I decided that I would take my inspiration from Batman’s inspiration. I would go a level deeper. As retold countless times in Batman’s origin story the young Bruce Wayne was terrified by bats when he accidentally fell into what would later become the vaunted Batcave.

But what if that formative experience had come in the form of the Momonga (or Japanese Dwarf Flying Squirrel)?

This little bastard has rabies, Ebola, animal AIDs and incurable diarrhoea. And it smells your fear.

Thus the Spangled Momonga (TM BigMrJosh) was born! With a two-tone brown & cream costume that mimicked the admittedly average colouration of the momonga and vicious knives attached to each forearm to mimic the tiny (but deadly teeth) of the dread momonga, I was ready to begin my superhero career.

ROUND 6 – THE NEVER-ENDING BATTLE TO ROUND A CORNER.

DC spared no expense when it came to giving us the true superhero experience. But they did adhere to a pretty strict rule of threes. For example, there are only three possible missions in DCUO. I list them here in order of frequency.

1) Punch a certain number of identical guys in the face until they die.

2) Collect a certain number of a certain item that drops out of the corpses of the guy you just punched to death.

3) Pick up something huge and put it in a specific corner.

You also have three ways of traveling to this bland, uninspired missions.

1) Flying in straight lines.

2) Running super fast in straight lines. And up buildings!

3) Clambering around like a monkey.

Obviously I chose the monkey option. That's how I'm livin'. This proved to be the final straw for DCUO. It turned out my ability to clamber up buildings was also my greatest weakness, because any time I tried to round a corner, The Spangled Momonga (still TM, I just haven't decided what direction I want to take the property yet.) would cling to the wall for dear life. So there I am, suspended literally centimetres from the mean streets of Gotham City, usually being shot at. 

The Final Indignity!

To sum up, in the words of my esteemed British colleague in terrible crime-fighting: "You could have more fun taping a comic to the wall and yelling at it from across the room." That sounds therapeutic. I'm gonna try it with the DCUO game disc.

Goddamn you, DC Universe Online. YOU BROKE MY HEART!

The Same as Last Year's...

I just went to the BNZ Literary Awards 2010 page to confirm that I hadn't won the Unpublished Writers Short Story Competition. I hadn't. Which is why I guess nobody felt the need to e-mail me. Thanks, BNZ. At least this fits nicely into my New Year's Resolution to show everybody.

I'll show them!

Admittedly, this is the exact same resolution I make every year, so it's more like carrying it over to the next year. I guess you could say I haven't achieved the goal to my satisfaction. New Year's provides a time to reflect, remember and refocus on my mission. It's kind of like renewing my vows. For vengeance.

Vengeance!

So since the BNZ doesn't want to pay me for my brilliance, I guess the rights for it revert to me. Which means you get it for free! At least someone wins.




A Walk on the Beach

We go for a walk on the beach. The shifting sand makes for hard walking, but Luke has a three-year-old’s desire to run and explore, which more than makes up for the tumbles he takes every once in a while. I am content to move at a slower pace, allowing Luke to rove up and down the beach, occasionally zooming past by way of a check in.

“Dad?”

I look up. I’d been miles away in my head, thinking adult thoughts, worrying about adult things. I welcomed the diversion. “Yeah, matey.”

My son holds out a tiny pink fist. “I found something.” He opens his hand to reveal a cream-and-orange crab claw. “Crab lost his hand,” he explains.

I adopted my fatherly wisdom face. “I expect he just traded it for something else.”

Luke looks dubious. “What like?”

“Maybe a seahorse tail...”

“Why would a crab want a seahorse tail for a hand?”

“Well he wouldn’t use it like a hand. More like a whip. To keep other crabs away from his dinner.”

Luke is clearly intrigued by this idea. He spends the next few minutes of our walk role-playing as The Crab with the Seahorse-Tail Hand. “Wa-pssh! Wa-pssh!” he yells as he flicks his left hand at afternoon joggers while his right hand snaps menacingly at the air. I get some funny looks, but I don’t mind. He isn’t hurting anybody. “Dad, what do crabs eat?” he yelled at me from up the beach.

“Salt and vinegar chips!” I call back.

“Get away from my chips!” he yells at passersby. For some reason he does this in a pirate accent. He scuttles up and down the beach merrily, warming my heart in direct opposition to the bite of the wind.

Eventually Luke tires of this game, and returns to his primary mission of scouring the beach. He retrieves the crab claw from his pocket.

“Dad.”

“Yeah, buddy.”

“So that means this claw belongs to a seahorse.”

“I guess it does.”

“I want to return it to him.”

“You can. If we see him.”

“’’k. Look for the seahorse with no tail.”

“Sure thing.”

Down by the water we add our shoe prints to the record of those who had passed by this day. There were dog prints, foot prints, shoe prints. Some of the prints face the same way as ours. Some of them are reversed. Luke tells me that those footprints are funny. “What’s so funny about them?” I ask him.

“Those people walked the whole way backwards. They’re so silly!” He giggles, and the sound lightens my heart. All of a sudden I was envious of Luke. I wanted to live in his world. The world that I inhabited had let me down one time too many. I gently guide my son around a pile of sand-encrusted dog droppings. The last thing I needed was to clean that out from between his toes.

A wave rushes up the beach, catching the two of us by surprise. I yelp and run for dry sand, but Luke stays, splashing gleefully. As the water abandons us he notices the pipis buried in the sand by his feet, blinking like a thousand staccato eyes.

“Dad, what are they doing?”

I wade back into the water and hoist him up into my arms. “They’re probably helping the seahorse look for his arm.”

But Luke is already over that and onto the next thing. “Why are there so many shells on the beach?”

I stopped to scoop up a handful of sand, and began to pick out the shells buried within. “Oh, there’s not that many. How many do you reckon there are?” I picked out the corner of a chocolate bar wrapper and flicked it away on the wind.

“On the whole beach?”

“Yeah.”

Luke’s face squished up into ‘think mode’. “Um... seven?”

I tried but failed to suppress the grin from my face. “Yeah, probably.”

Luke squirms out of my grip to collect his own handful of shells. Mount Maunganui watches cautiously as we slowly advance down the beach toward it. Legend says that the Mountain made a similar journey a long time ago, all alone. I wonder if it sympathises with me, or whether it thinks I’m being indulgent. The sky is overcast, and I pull my jacket a little bit tighter to fortify me against the cutting wind. Luke seems not to feel it at all as he quests all over the beach in search of mystery and adventure.

“So what are they all for?”

“Hm?”

“The shells, Dad! What are they for?” He holds one up to me.

“Payment,” I say, accepting his payment for fatherly services rendered.

“Pavement?”

“No, payment. Like money. Shells are sea money.”

“Oh. Has someone lost their money?”

“It looks that way.”

“Who? A sailor-man?”

“Well, some sailors get paid in shells, but remember that you can’t use shells to pay for human things, so they can only buy stuff off fish. Most sailors like to get paid in normal money.” I flick the shell over in my hand, studying it with exaggerated seriousness. “Probably all of these shells belonged to a mermaid.”

“What’s a mermaid?” Luke had started collecting shells. He stuffed handfuls of them into the pockets of his hoodie, the pockets of his little pants. When his pockets are bulging he looks at me imploringly.

I sigh as I bend down to do my share of collecting. “A mermaid is a lady who lives in the sea,” I explain. “She has some human bits and some fish bits so she can live happily under the water and swim fast like a fish.”

“Can I be a mermaid?”

“You would be a merman. That’s a boy mermaid.”

“Yup. I’m a boy.”

“I hope so. Otherwise Luke was a bad choice.”

Again my son giggled. “Dad, we have to return all this sea money too.”

Yikes. “How are you going to return it? You’re not a merman yet, mister.”

He bit his bottom lip, brain hard at work. “Maybe we can leave it somewhere the mermaid will find it?”

“Where would you suggest?”

“There.” With a shell-filled hand, he pointed to a rocky outcropping just beyond where the waves break. A thin path of rocks trails out to Moturiki, the blowhole.

I think very carefully about how far I want to take this. In the end, I decide life is too short, especially the period in your life where you believe in the magical and the fantastic. “Sure,” I tell him, “but there are rocks, and water pools at the bottom when the tide changes. You’ll need to hang onto me while we walk over there.”

“Okay, Dad,” he nods. So serious. Whatever it takes to get the job done. Again, I feel a small pang of envy. To Luke the world is still black and white: you find something that belongs to someone else, you try to return it.

I hoist my son up onto my back. “Hang on tight,” I whisper.

“I will, Dad.” His little arms grip around my throat and his legs cling to my hips. We must look like a koala bear family. I put one arm under his backside to hold him up and we’re on our way. As I carefully make my way up the path, Luke calls out items of interest he spots along the way. A beer can. A short length of fishing line. A chip packet. The remnants of a smashed and water-logged cell phone, now no more than raw building materials for the denizens of the rock pools. A nautilus shell, that Luke insists we retrieve. My knees pop loudly as I lean down for him to grab it. I sway unsteadily on my way back up and I realise that I’m nervous. I have my most precious possession clinging to my back and I’m – what? – climbing across sea-slick rocks to deliver a cargo of shells to a fiction.

I must be crazy.

The path is wider than I remember. The sand of the beach gives way to stubby grass. I exhale. My regrets melt away. Here we are alone, just the two of us and our story. Usually the island is host to many tourists, snapping photos and holding hands. The ominous sky must have moved them all on today. Or maybe there just wasn’t room on the island for them and our story, maybe someone somewhere knew that I needed it to be just me and Luke, and generously granted my wish. When Luke was born I promised his mother, her hand clinging weakly to my uselessly strong one, that I would try to instil in him the belief that the world was a special place. That was what she believed, and maybe I would too if she were still here to share it with us. I would hide the truth about this world as long as I was able – though God knew, some days were harder than others - and fulfil her last wish.

We reach the end of the island just as my arms are beginning to tire. The sea dips and swells, it ebbs and flows. The water is an impenetrable blue; I can almost believe myself that a mermaid waits just below the surface, rueing her financial carelessness. On the side furthest from the beach I lower Luke from my back. I indicate to him the point on the rocks where I plan to make our offering.

“Do you think she’ll see them?” he asks me.

“I think so. Mermaids come here most nights to sit and comb their hair.” I knew that the seaward side of Moturiki would be swept clean of shells by the next big wave. If Luke wanted to return to ‘check’ on the shell stash, we would find confirmation that the shells had been claimed. “Should we leave the claw too, buddy? Maybe the mermaid will have a better chance of finding its owner than we will.”

He agrees, and hands it reverently to me. He watches on from the flat grassy area at the north of the island as I clamber down on the rocks to build a rough cairn of shells. A lone seagull stands sentinel, watching me with a tilted head from the northernmost rocks. I crown the pile with the claw and gratefully clamber back up the rocks. I can’t understand how guys can climb down decked out with fishing gear - I was half petrified just carrying a pile of shells.

“Thanks, Dad,” my son says with a big smile.

“You’re welcome.” Although in a way the whole thing had been a ruse, I still felt strangely fulfilled for having made the offering.

As I wrestle Luke back up onto my back for the return trip, he notices some initials carved into the rock. “What’s that for, Dad?”

I couldn’t help the scowl that accompanied my answer. “Graffiti.” Not only the rock was scarred; even the trees had suffered indignations, swear words misspelt on their trunks, love hearts and boasts tattooed on Moturiki’s surfaces.

“What’s grr-feety?”

“It’s something silly that humans do. Come on, mate. Let’s go home.” Again, I cautiously navigate the rocky pathway. We trudge up the beach to the path leading back to the car. The grasses adorning the dunes sway in time to the rhythm conducted by the wind. Some grease-stained newspaper, remnants of a hot lunch, is passed like a netball between clumpy teams of grass. The pohutukawa trees lining the street would soon bloom.

“Dad?”

“Yeah, mate.”

“Why do people leave all this rubbish around the place?”

I look down into my son’s wide, wondering, wonderful eyes and for once I am at a loss for words. “I don’t know, mate. I don’t know.”

Happy New Year, readers. Don't make resolutions. They're stupid.

What Kind of Facebook Annoyance are you?

Remember back before Facebook was a thing? 2006 was weird, right? How did people know what other people they knew were doing all day every day? It was a rough time. 

I remember when I first got on Facebook. We had a stormy 1 month relationship where we couldn’t spend enough time together. Then the ardour cooled.

In time I realized the quintessential truth about Facebook: It’s a great way for annoying people to be even more annoying. Facebook’s a magnifying glass, focusing the beams of annoying from every annoying person you’ve ‘friended’ right onto your tiny metaphorical ant body.

Think about it. Right now, you’re kind of annoyed at me because every week or so I link you to undeniable proof that I am amazing. That’s got to eat away at a person. I don’t even blame you.

The weird thing about Facebook is that it’s completely narcissistic and yet the people who use it still fit into specific cliques. Facebook is like digital High School, with all the pesky learning replaced by bitchiness.

I have perfected a method of determining what category your friends fit into, utilizing the Glee theory: everyone adheres to one specific clique with the exception of the main character (you), who can multi-clique. In other words, don’t worry: you’re perfect.

You jocknerd, you.

If you came across something like this on Facebook it would be as a quiz written by a Tanzanian special needs student and it would have sixteen instances of the word ‘LOLZ’ and zero instances of punctuation. Lucky for you this is a blog, not Facebook. So that means you have a slim chance of understanding:

What Kind of Facebook Annoyance are you? (Not a quiz)

The Jock

Wanted for constantly posting: Blah blah alcohol, blah blah, sex, blah, blah, partying, blah.

If your life is a never ending party and you have time to post it all over Facebook, while intoxicated, then you may be a Jock.

The Emo

Wanted for constantly posting: Lamentations about how horrible the world is. (But only for them and they’re going to tell you all about it.)

When I was in High School Emos hadn’t even been invented yet. That’s one of the clues that let me know that they’re completely unnecessary. Darwinian Theory suggests that something that cuts itself has missed the memo about survival of the fittest.

You are a Facebook Emo if you think your cold is really that much worse than everyone else’s (Man flu is an exception because that shit takes you to the brink), if your job sucks more than everyone else’s or if your ugliness is uglier than everyone else’s (even though that one’s true)

The Hippy

Wanted for constantly posting: Status updates demanding urgent action against a myriad of issues you have no hope of influencing.

The pesky thing about charity is that it’s always after your money or your time or it wants you to do something.

Piss. Off.

I spend my whole life trying to get money, and spend my spare time by avoiding doing things. I really feel like charity doesn’t understand me.

But Facebook does. Facebook knows that if you make your profile picture pink that someone, somewhere is going to be so inspired that they will just cure cancer. Just like that.

"I want to dedicate my Nobel Prize to that guy on Facebook. If only everyone cared like you, man. 

You are a Facebook hippy if you post anything to your status that says ‘93% of people won’t post this. Will you?’ P.S I’ll assume that question is rhetorical and you already know my answer is 'fuck no, I won’t!'

I am not even making this up, but one of my Facebook friends once posted a status asking for urgent action to stop the Lithuanian army from using dogs for target practice. Is Lithuania even a place?! Let’s imagine this incredibly potent issue is resolved by your status update. Do you know what the Lithuanian Army will practice on then? Peasants. Good job, Hippy.

Would you repost that? You’d be doing the world a bigger favour.

The Princess

Wanted for constantly posting: Glamorous pictures of themselves.

Do you have a friend who is pretty sure she (usually, but could be a he in this egalitarian age) is almost too beautiful? The sort of beautiful that would make a Greek God turn them into a crane, if Greek Gods were still doing that sort of thing. (If they are, could someone let me know because I have a list) This person thinks they are beautiful like the world couldn’t survive without regular glimpses of their beautiful beautifulness?

You are a Facebook Princess if your profile pictures were ever taken yourself in a mirror because you are looking sixteen kinds of gorgeous right now and there’s no one around to appreciate it.

CAUTION: Don’t tell this person they’re pretty! You’re just encouraging them if you do. And they probably still won’t have sex with you.

The Attention Seeker

Wanted for constantly posting: Cryptic messages that require people to respond for further elucidation.

Facebook simultaneously makes it harder and easier for attention seekers. It’s easier because all they have to do is type a message and boom everyone can give them attention. It’s harder because no one cares anymore. They have 835 other people doing the exact same thing. So then attention seekers realize they need to think more like Nickelback.

But not in terms of hair.

They need a hook. They need something that people will not be able to resist posting back to. They need something that is so damn intriguing and mysterious that people would rather kill themselves than not find out what your messages refers to. And so we end up with posts like this:

“Oh my God!” attentions seeker’s friends will reply. “Are you okay?” “What’s wrong?” “Do you need a casserole?” or in my case “you should probably just kill yourself” because I hate being Facebook manipulated so amateurishly.

The above is my fantasy post. Because I work for an organization that asks each participant to make the agonizing re-contract/don't re-contract decision each and every year around January, I am fortifying myself for 120 of these, instead:

Do you want to know what their decision is? They know you want to know. But nothing is free in this world. You’ve got to ask for it. Unless you’re a total a-hole, like me. Then you can just say, “Okay! See you!” It’s particularly effective because then even if they had decided to stay they might go home anyway. Then you don’t have to worry about them pulling the same shit next year. 

I’ve already done more to change the world than one of those goddamn hippies.

Look guys, I made it worse!

The God Botherer

Wanted for constantly posting: Jesus’ incredible influence on their life.

Have you ever read someone’s post on Facebook and it’s made you want to go to church and give thanks? Me neither. Points for trying though.

All I’m saying is, if you and the Big Man are so tight, wouldn’t he have accepted your friend request by now?

Friend Request: Ignored!

The Socialite

Wanted for constantly posting: Posts that are relevant to only a tiny percentage of their astronomical number of friends.

Let’s get something straight right off the bat: having 836 friends is impossible. Let’s say you were to go to each of your friends’ houses for dinner just one time. It would take you almost three years to get to them all.

Most people have, like, 4 friends. So aside from screwing up the definition of the word friend for us, (thanks Facebook) it has also created the Socialite.

You are a Socialite if your number of Facebook friends equals the number of people you have met in your entire life. The Socialite will friend you for accidentally elbowing them on the street.

As far as Facebook annoyances go the Socialite is pretty minor, because their friend count is just a number I never have to look at unless I want to (I don’t want to).

But it gets worse. To be a really effective (read: annoying) Socialite, you must constantly remind your friends how many friends you have and that you are doing awesome stuff all the time.

Make sure you tag all those people so they can see too. Otherwise they might forget that you’re friends.

The Kid that either Should have Studied Harder or has Gone Off Their Meds.

Wanted for constantly posting: Status updates that aren’t even in a human language.

What?! Is this some kind of code cracking puzzle?

Listen, buddy. If I wanted to do something intelligent like code cracking, I wouldn’t be on Facebook, now, would I?

The ‘Deep’ One

Wanted for constantly posting: Someone else’s philosophy/quotes/life.

 

Right now you’re thinking I’m a genius. And while you are completely correct, let me just tell you six words that may alter your opinion: Sun Tzu, T.S Elliot and Jessica Simpson. There’s already about six phrases in this blog that you could put as your status update and your friends would think you’re spreading your toast with amazing each morning.

If you want to do that then be my guest, but at least have the goddamn human decency to put my name at the end of it.

Some people on Facebook spend their entire daily status update allotment on quoting other people’s brilliance.

Wait, what?

There isn’t a daily status update allotment?

Well I guess I just pulled Facebook’s ass out of the fire. Many of these… unsavoury Facebook types could be minimized by imposing a 5 times a day limit on Facebook status updates. Facebook, if you do this, for God’s sake give me a credit. I’m trying to make a point here!

JAM!

My friend Sarah, who possess talent enough to fill a large talentless room, was kind enough to give me my first 'commission' recently. I put commission in quotes because you are apparently supposed to be paid for this sort of thing, but Sarah and I have never worked that way and see no reason to start now. She even gave me credit for the writing, so in the spirit of mutual back-patting I am posting it here so that you can:
A) Read it, then
B) Go and check out her sites:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Just-Add-Music-Photography-NZ/184206350662?v=info
http://www.flickr.com/photos/justaddmusicnz/


Thank you, please.

JAM Photography NZ.

The word 'Jam" probably calls to mind the image of a sweet, fruity treat, heavy on the sugar. Or maybe you think of the magical sound that comes when skilled musicians get together to ‘jam’. Or I suppose you could think of, like, your finger getting jammed in the door. I hate when that happens.

Meet Sarah. 

Sarah loves music and photography. And that’s all. But Sarah’s clever, see, because she’s managed to jam her two obsessions into one giant-sized obsession:

JAM Photography NZ.

(Oh, actually, Sarah also loves cats. But that’s not really relevant to this bio.)

'JAM' is short for Just Add Music Photography, an amazingly pure representation of what Sarah does.
Here’s the maths for if you’re that way inclined:

Photography + Music = Sarah

Sarah takes photographs. She takes photographs of music. This is a tricky endeavour, because it’s very hard to get music to stay still and look this way. But Sarah makes it look easy. I think it has something to do with her fanatical love of what she does. But another 1000 words wouldn’t depict one fifth of the beauty you can see in just one of her pictures (there I go with the Maths again. Sorry.) So what are you doing still reading this? Look at the photos!

For musical photography jam-packed with action, intensity and talent, check out Just Add Music Photography NZ. If your band’s worth snapping, let Sarah know and she'll get the shots worth seeing.

[- bio written by Sarah's highly talented writer friend BigMrJosh, check out his blog http://www.peeweethekiwi.blogspot.com/ ]

Daihatsu!

For many years my stepfather has owned a 1992 Daihatsu Rocky SE. The SE stands for suicide engine. The Rocky is roundly considered to be the unsafest vehicle on the road.

I don’t know where Daihatsu is headquartered, but whatever Asian country houses these terrorist engineering mavericks is having a good laugh at the expense of all the other countries foolish enough to import their vehicles. Translated to English, Daihatsu means ‘suspension and accurate steering are for girls. And we drown our girls in the river.’

If the Rocky was a Transformer, its name would be DeathTrap (as it is often named anyway). Its two forms would be a precariously balanced 4-wheel-drive and a dirty pile of scrap. The pile of scrap would actually be the more useful of the two forms. At least then the other transformers could chuck it at enemy robots.

The Daihatsu Rocky draws inspiration from Rocky Balboa, the Sylvester Stallone character you may remember from such films as Rocky, Rocky 2, Rocky 3 and Rocky 4. I could go on... but won’t. You know how in the beginning Rocky is an out-of-shape nobody who trains hard and ends up a champion? The Rocky is kind of like that, but only the out-of-shape bit.

Pictured here: what people don't do when they realise the full capability of their Daihatsu Rocky.

In a way, the Rocky is the manliest car in existence. It takes every corner like it’s being driven by Jason Bourne and he’s late for work. On a completely straight, completely flat road it bounces around  as though the San Andreas fault line has a personal vendetta against it. The simple act of accelerating – or any kind of incline – will cause the Rocky to bellow like a wounded bison. These features combine in a wonderfully retarded way to make the Rocky seem more than the sum of its parts. I was filled with an almost irrepressible desire to scream “Yeeeeee-ha!” as I drove it. The psychological toll of driving The DeathTrap was staggering; it was almost as though I had lost the will to live. I certainly lost the will to drive safely. My wife will tell you that after a week of driving the Rocky I began to think of myself as something of a stunt driver. My driving conscience had devolved to the point where I treated other vehicles as nothing more than obstacles to my long-distance reversing. I have heard it said that you should avoid getting your ultimate car too soon in life, because then you have nothing left to look forward to. The Rocky works in a similar way. You should never drive the Rocky until you’re absolutely ready to give up the misconception that road safety is anything more than a tragic oxymoron.

Another thing the Rocky doesn't care about: No Parking signs

Despite all this, my stepfather steadfastly refuses to sell the Rocky. He also refuses to clean it, which may actually play in my favour. Because one day it will have enough dust and crap on it to make a better bonfire than vehicle. And on that day I will be there with marshmallows. 

The End

Violent Video Games made me a Lunatic... I Guess.

Video games get a bad rap because some people believe that they promote antisocial behaviour. I’m not antisocial. Look, I’m typing this for you right now. Do you want my perspective? Of course you do. Blaming people being morons on videogames is like blaming geese for playing silly buggers around the oil pipes in the Gulf of Mexico. Did watching 80s cartoon Mask make you want to put on a helmet and pilot a car that is also a plane? Actually, that may be a bad example because I have never wanted anything more!

A.K.A What Bigmrjosh saw himself doing as a job, circa age 8. (There's still time.)

I’ve never really played much Grand Theft Auto because I tried it once and it was hard. My friend told me you can hit someone in the face with a shovel, but only if they’re a hooker. I don’t have any desire to do this, but even if I did I don’t own a spade. Or some hookers. If I was in a hooker spading mood, I would probably fire up the Playstation and spade some hookers on there. I would do that instead of giving it a shot in real life for two reasons. Firstly, I am not a moron. And secondly, I am far too pretty for prison.

“Yo lady, you got a spade?”

Role playing games take this stuff to a whole ‘nother level. For example, RPG logic dictates that whenever anyone leaves something inside a shiny chest they mean for you to have it. And that doesn’t matter if you are on a mission from God or the village goat boy. It’s first in, first served. I have pinched enough stuff playing RPGs to open up an antiques store, but that doesn’t mean when I come to your house you need to count the cutlery afterward.

Another thing that you should only do in video games: Chicken abuse. Besides, anyone who has played Zelda: Link to the Past will know there are some pretty goddamn serious consequences for this act.

Video games are without a doubt inspirational. Some guy was inspired to propose to his girlfriend through hacking Chrono Trigger. I think that’s a good thing (but I haven’t seen his girlfriend). Mostly they inspire me to stay indoors but, hey, that keeps me out of trouble! I can't understand how some dude can play Modern Warfare 2, then decide he wants to replicate it in the real world. That takes actual effort.

I think it's more likely that some people are just predisposed to putting on a leather jacket and shooting up a lunch room, and they would probably do that whether you gave them a turn on the PS3, a copy of Mein Kampf or blindfolded them, spun them around 16 times and put an M16 in their hands. The people who are calling this the fault of video games are probably the same ones who called those guys ‘fag’ every day of their high school career.

There. Now that we've dealt with that, shall we discuss whether video games are art...?

Farewelling a Friend

If you are a regular reader of my blogs – especially during what will come to be known as the ‘China Period’ – you will recognise my plucky, clucky friend, Chicky.

Chicky’s origins are shrouded in secrecy. Some say he was a government experiment gone horribly right, some say he was plucked at random from a bargain bin in a department store, some say his owner has a sieve-like memory and is really grasping at straws since he forgot long ago where Chicky came from...

Anyway, Chicky has had an exciting life (for a soft toy). He has been to Australia, the UK, China, Fiji, Hawaii, Dubai and Paeroa. He has had countless adventures such as going down the hydroslide, and being dropped.

Initially, Chicky had a sound chip in his yellow squishy body that could be used to elicit a proud crow. After too much adventuring, it now sounds like in this book I read where a demon called the main character on the telephone. There’s still a little bit of chicken sound in there, but it’s mostly kind of scratchy and garbled and evil.

After much discussion and a fortuitous gift (which we’ll get to soon), it has been decided to retire Chicky. It is a sad day but a necessary one for the advancement of the travelling soft toy species. When my wife finished up at her school, Corbin, one of her students, gifted her with a stuffed kiwi he had made his very self. Peewee the kiwi will be taking over Chicky’s travel responsibilities. He has the advantage of being quite ‘New Zealandy’ which will be useful in our roles as ambassadors for NZ, of sorts. He has no voice chip, which means he can not be used as an instrument of corruption by The Devil. He also has an actual, rememberable origin (although I will probably just make up a new one anyway, as I am wont to do.)

So thank you for your service, Chicky. The blog at www.chicketychinathechinesechicken.blogspot.com will remain a testament to all the good work you did in your travels. And long may Peewee continue your good works. Check out my new travel blog at www.peeweethekiwi.blogspot.com. This is where Cush and I will report our magnificent findings as we stumble our way through life in Japan. It'll be getting underway in August, so get your follow on!
As always, my own random thoughts will continue to be haphazardly filtered through the lens of The Itchy Barn.

Chicky   2006-2010

Introducing Peewee

Likes: Worms, Travelling to exotic places, Rap battling, The thrill of being endangered, Afternoon naps.

Dislikes: Flying, Weasels, Flying weasels, Peanuts (he has an allergy).