Author Archive
Global Financial Meltdown: My Role in it All October 14th, 2008
You can’t read anything these days without it relating to the global financial apocalypse. All in all it’s getting a bit dull now. The prospect of war with Iceland seems to have receded, which is fairly disappointing and all the news consists of flashing red numbers and doom laden graphs.
As everyone seems to be cheering up a bit it might be a good time to begin to apportion blame.
Many people believe that the root cause of the root cause of the collapse of the world economy has been the lack of liquidity in bank lending as a result sub prime mortgage lending in the US. The de-regulation of US financial services would be an easy target when looking for someone to blame but I believe this is too simplistic.
In truth much of the responsibility for the situation we now find ourselves in sits firmly on the shoulders of the Guardian. I know this because I saw it happen before my very eyes.
For the last couple of years I’ve been a fan of the Gamesblog run by the Guardian. The Guardian has really gone for the whole blogging thing but the one about video games in particular is the one that I look at everyday. Mainly because I like video games but also for the people that comment on there.
The main reason for its success is down to the fact that used to use pretty ancient blogging software. As a result quite a few people found that it was one of the only sites that they could look at whilst they were at work. Over the years a little community grew up of people that found they could avoid doing any work by using the comments section of the blog to have discussions about the types of drugs they used to take and biscuits.
As a result of the number of completely arbitrary comments the Guardian agreed to put a post up everyday just for comments. I haven’t really looked around the rest of the Guardian site but I’m pretty sure this was unusual. At its height this post could get over 500 comments in a day which just made up a very weird conversation.
It was quite obvious that of the 50 odd regular posters quite a few of them were from the banking sector. Particularly Lloyds TSB in all parts of the country. Over the last few years I’ve learnt quite a lot about Lloyds TSB.
This was all working fine until the Guardian decided it would be a really good idea to update its blogging software. Unfortunately this has meant that the comments now rely on java script and can’t be accessed in many work places.
It seems unlikely that it is any coincidence that the day after numerous Lloyds TSB employees were forced to go back to working for a living that our banking system collapsed. It also says quite a lot for their recruitment policy if when their employees do a full days work for a change the share price falls through the floor.
I hope this can serve as a warning to all those organisations out there that want to begin using draconian monitoring software. There can be unintended consequences. Sometimes those consequences can be worldwide recession.
Posted in Games, Media | Comments (0)
A win with the arrows and an outrageous misfortune October 9th, 2008
If you cut me I bleed darts. Ever since devoting much of 1986 to the Red Lion’s dart board I’ve had a passion for chucking little bits of metal at walls. To be honest I’ve never really been that good at it but I think I must have a genetic link with the game.
After all, my Dad looks quite a lot like Bobby Bobby Dazzler George and I look quite a lot like my Dad. It doesn’t take great deductive reasoning to figure out that one day I too will look like Bobby which means that at last I could be mistaken for a serious athlete.
The fundamental difference between me and Bobby George is that whilst he is the greatest world champion we never had, I have actually won an international darts competition.
I went on holiday a few weeks ago. It was all right. Like any self respecting middle class Englishman I poor scorn on the concept of manufactured entertainment that characterises the package holiday and see it for the contrived jollity it actually is. Well I did until I found out they give you certificates if you win things.
We stayed in a pretty nice hotel, as it turned out, and one of the things provided to keep us happy were daily games and events designed to keep us hanging around the hotel. Having said that I quite fancied the prospect of the KILLER DARTS competition as I hadn’ played darts in years.
It was looking a bit dodgy to begin with as I was the only person that bothered to enter. After being patronised by the frighteningly happy entertainment man for a few games I finally got a proper competition. Actually this was a bit of a disappointment as I’d noticed I was easily going to beat the bloke paid by the hotel as he always missed the board if there was any danger of me losing. Ah well.
Donald was clearly a much greater challenge. He hadn’t played for years either and neither of us appeared to have much ability to score much more than single figures. That’s in fact pretty hard with darts.
I’d have thought that somebody out there must be asking the question, what the hell is KILLER DARTS? A very good question.
The odds that I’ll remember all of the rules is remote but I’ll give it a go.
- Each player has 4 lives
- The first player throws three darts and must beat the score of 31. If he/she doesn’t then he/she loses a life. The opponent must then beat the previous score set by the original player or also lose a life.
- The first player must then beat the score set by the second player with 10 added to it. So if the second player got 45 in the first round then the first player must beat 55. The second player must then beat the score set by the first player or lose a life.
- The first player must then get a score of less than that set by the second player (in the previous round) without missing the board. The second player must then get less than this.
- The first player must only hit odd numbers. The second player must also only hit odd numbers but get a higher score.
- The first player must get three different colours for example white, black and green. The second player must do the same.
- If at any point a player loses all of their lives the sudden death round begins. In sudden death each player takes it in turns to get three 20’s, three 18’s and three 19’s. Theoretically someone could get this in three darts by getting trebles in each but it takes a bit longer..in fact much much longer.
Anyone can see that the creation of the last round makes this game complete nonsense to play. Both myself and Donald had great difficulty in figuring out what the hell we were supposed to be doing but the only thing that really matters in all this is that I won.
Winning the KILLER DARTS has to be one of the proudest achievements in my life to date. Obviously something as important as this needed to be marked with a certificate and fortunately the hotel did not let me down.
I was told that all I had to do was go to the bar at 9:15 where they would have gathered most of the hotel residents to clap and generally applaud my dart throwing ability. I was very excited.
By the time my moment of glory arrived I was on my way to the bar thinking about how people were going to hoist me on their shoulders and parade me around. That was until I got to the bar and realised the horrible truth.
I have no idea why anyone thought this would be a good idea but they had decided to organise the certificate giving ceremony at the same time as the reptile show. Why would you even have a reptile show in a hotel? What if they escape and eat people?
I can’t stand seeing snakes on the TV so there was no chance that I was going to go in the same room as one. As much as I hate snakes I also really love getting certificates. This created one of the greatest dilemmas I have ever had to contend with. I dealt with this by walking about in a small circle looking a bit mental.
Before they announced my achievement they gave a certificate to some kid called Sam who had apparently won the memory game (I was watching through the doors). This made me really angry. If I’d known there was a memory game I could have probably have won that as well. I can easily remember more than a 7 year old. Mainly because I’ve seen more things.
As they announced my certificate I decided I had to confront my fear and strode into the bar looking straight forward. I reckon that bit must have looked quite good as the electric doors flew open in front of me. Unfortunately I ruined the affect a bit by walking into a pillar.
I made it onto the stage where they asked me if I was pleased to have won and all I could think to say was I’m scared of snakes.
Sam then tried to show me up by stroking an iguana in front of me. His dad was there so I couldn’t punch him.
Posted in Misc | Comments (1)
My favourite people in the world September 18th, 2008
I’ve given this a remarkable amount of thought and I’m now in a position to clarify that my two favourite people in the world are He PingPing (the samllest man in the world) and Bao Xishun (the used to be tallest man in the world). Apparently Bao has been usurped by some Ukranian bloke but I’m not fickle.
At the end of the day if you had a dolphin in a tricky situation then you’re not going to ring up some random Ukranian are you? No, of course not.
I still wonder how they came to the conclusion that the only way to solve a dolphin’s life was to find a bloke with really long arms. Surely you’d just try a coat hanger with the end bent round first. I would but I’m very far from being a vet.
Anyway, imgaine how happy I was to see Pingping in the news this week having his photo taken with Svetlana Pankratova. She, apparently, has the longest legs in the world. For a woman at least. A remarkable achievement, I’m sure you’ll agree.
I have no idea why they were having their picture taken together. I couldn’t be arsed to read the story. I’m just content to know it happened.
Posted in Media | Comments (0)