Going to Fibber Magees in dublin tonight. If you want to come and don't know how to get there call me.

The Story So Far

What I did on my summer holidays:

Well lets see... I spent most of June building and setting up my new PC and generally being a total shut-in. Then I did some work in July, which resulted in money that disappeared so fast I suspect I may have burnt it.
Then I went to California, where I played tech. support for my dads office for two/three weeks, put on a few kilo's and bought some nice clothes.
And I arrived back two days ago.
Since I got back I've been going to the gym every day! (2/2 ain't bad) But that is probably only going to last until my first hangover: natch.
California was a big vacuum of no friends and no drinking so I'm in a big hurry to go out... which is also a good way to avoid studying for my host [a veritable buffet] of repeats (exams): natch (Is there a limit to how many times you are allowed say 'natch'? Where would I look that up, 'Natch-etiquette'?).
Of course this is slightly way-laid by my complete lack of funds. By my rough calculation I am around 90-150 euro in debt (Subtracting credit card from bank balance to reach this figure), with no obvious way to climb out of this hole except working my 1-day a week job for a few weeks and staying in my house like some sort of leper-hermit; which is how I got into this state in the first place. bah.

-ANkh

Hope - new version

Here is a rhyming version of 'Hope is the thing with barbs', enjoy.

Hope is the thing with barbs
That flashes near the beach,
Which Shines of Silver– Glitters of Gold
Never quite in reach,

And luring when all is calm;
And never giving peace
That could relax the weathered soul
Thats problems willn’t cease.

But when the trap is sprung;
And I take the bait,
Then my fate is set,
And barbs don’t abate.

-Ankhwatcher

Hope

'Hope is the thing with feathers' or 'Hope' is a wonderful Emily Dickinson poem comparing hope to a bird.
Here it is:

Hope

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.

-Emily Dickinson

My own experience with hope has not quite followed Dickinson's pattern, and lead me to wonder.
So here is my take:
Note: This is the first draft, and I will be scratching my head over fixing the rhyming scheme, there is still work to do.

Hope

Hope is the thing with barbs

That flashes in the water,

And shines –glimmers gold

Always just ahead,

And luring when all is calm;

And never giving peace

That could relax the weathered soul

That’s seen such rough a sea.

But when the trap is sprung;

And I take the bait,

Then my fate is set,

And barbs don’t abate.

-Ankhwatcher

-Love ya kids.

I'm using it to try out the idea of using a phone with a qwerty keyboard.

Hey I got a tmobile sidekick I'd! (It's a big bulky phone with no features)

Okay now I can post through ping.fm from my Yahoo! messenger account! Nice!

Today I decided I wanted an account on a website called 'Ping.fm'. When I went to their sign up page I found to my dismay that they were in what is known as a 'closed beta'.
A 'closed beta' is where they have a functional product but are still limiting its use to a small group of hand-picked test users. Traditionally a 'closed beta' would be the step before an 'open beta' where the software or service is expected to be fully functional but lacking polish. But in the case of this website I suspect the 'closed beta' will lead to a full release.
Their sign up page has details.

Upon reviewing their sign up page I decided it would probably be best for me to send them a communique requesting access to their closed beta.
The message is preserved below:

It seems to me that ping.fm is all about laziness. A website that will stop me from having to go to the trouble of checking both twitter and plurk.
Naturally this a service I as a slacker (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_SubGenius#Slack) would like to avail of.
Your sign up page essentially gave me what I chose to consider two options: I could either google to find one the "many sources providing them" or "send [you] a message and try to swindle an account from [you]".
In keeping with what i feel is the spirit of ping.fm I tried to gauge which of these two options would involve the least amount of work for me.
Of course this is very hard to determine from the given starting position: but an email is always fairly easy and convenient however a google search can be very unreliable, especially when one is trying to gain a limited resource. So I chose to appeal instead to your organisation directly to grant me access to your exciting new service.

So how about it, may I have a beta key?

Oh and it goes (oxymoronically) without saying that if you ever attempt to charge for this service I will make and escape so swift I will leave an Ankhwatcher shaped cloud behind me.

Your sincerely,
Ankhwatcher

The Longest Day - 21/06/2008

On Saturday the 21st of June I attended a Phantomfm.
Many notes were made into my small Moleskin notebook that night. They are expanded below:
(Notes: The Longest Day had started for me at 8am and had involved a great deal of standing, I didn't really want to be at this gig. I just felt I should be. As a result of this most of my notes were angry whingings and complaints.)

The first performers took the stage, the band CODES.
Codes specialised in hugely-generic could-be-anybody rock.

I've taken position standing around at the back of the plush, carpeted hall enjoying a heated debate about which advert we had heard this "undiscovered" "indie" band on.
And why the fuck am I listening to indie in this fucking carpeted, soft-lit, cube-stool infested hell-hole anyway?
This isn't Rock and Roll.

I think I'm the only person here in a band t-shirt*: Man I hate my generation.
*Rolling Stones. I bought it in Temple Bar. It's really cool.

Considering challenging people to tic-tac-toe to break the monotony.
-I would, but the problem is... I'm shit at tic-tac-toe. The best I can ever do is stalemate.

Jesus Christ!
Codes are dedicating Every Fucking Song!
They probably think they'll never be on stage again. I hope their right.

I've found the balcony... Seems like a good place to spit on the acts from.

CODES - So generic they practically fade into the ambient noise.

The Kinetics Take The Stage
They seem better - Could be the placebo effect.

On the next page of my notebook is a drawing of a tall table. This was used to illustrating a point. The point was something about tables...

Things to say before leaving the upstairs balcony:
You stay here, I'm going to punch-out the lead singer.
I had originally intended to write more, but instead I went downstairs in search of adventure.

This band likes to end every song like it's the end of the set. A lot of "Thank you!"'s irritating.

Why do so many of the wankers* have curly hair?
*I meant the audience... and maybe one of the band.

Bah! This is a good song.
I think I would require a high intake of Jack Daniels to enjoy it... But doing JD shots on my own... that can't be a good idea.

The next page features a sketch of a pair of legs, ending in large ugg boots with the legend "I'm trying to draw a still-life of a pair of fucking ugg-boots! Get out of the fucking way!"
I hope that's self explanatory.

The page after features two badly drawn boxes, scribbled out. And the legend: "Bah. Can't draw a cube. Might as well draw the damned Easter Bunny."
I'm not sure how the Easter Bunny got involved in it... presumably it made sense at the time.

The next few entries are very scattered, I'll attempt to explain them as I go.
Upon seeing a girl with a quite broad face, lots of blond hair and very short-shorts:
I wonder if anyone has ever told that girl she looks like Dolly Parton?

Feeling I was using my notebook as a cover for my general feeling of pointlessness stemming from my inability to enjoy music for music's sake I wrote:
Take refuge in a notebook.
It's a slogan. Of sorts.

Then after attempting to move my left foot and finding much more difficult than one would expect:
Fucking sticky floors - Every surface not covered in carpet it coated in fucking glue.

"Where are you from?"
I've never had a decent answer to that one.
I'm from Dublin, Ireland. But the reason why you are asking is because my voice sounds different. It's partly because I was born in the states, but it's really from watching too much British TV.

Ham Sandwich Take The Stage.

Current position: Dance floor.
Current thought: Wish I still had my sunglasses.

Lead guitarist reminds me of the character who said "It's" at the start of every Monty Python's Flying Circus Episode.

Second string and bassist seem to be hiding at the edges of the stage.

Lead singer is dressed in that grey sacking and Black Belt thing from the eighties that doesn't look good on anyone.
Lead Guitarist is dressed as a male whore.

Fuck me these lights are nuts! I should have brought a hat!

Some Mop-Haired cunt is using me as a back-rest while the lighting technician tries to weed out the epileptics from the herd.

Second string looks like he is going to faint from heat exhaustion.
Perhaps he should take off his jacket?

I'll nod along and smile. That'll fool them into thinking I have a sense of rhythm.

Oh good, the second string took off his jacket. Looks much happier now.

I think "The Raging Homophobes" would be a great band name.

Ah Dublin. Everyone is a cover band.
For An Encore Ham Sandwich Play 'Material Girl'.
Seems an odd choice - as far as I can tell the lead singer is actually dressed as Kim Wilde. Kids in America would seem a more synchronous option.

And finally:
Next time I'm bringing some CIF! I can't move my bloody feet!

After that I scarpered. Stopping only to tell some pretty-young-thing from New York that her and her friends were going the wrong way across Dame St. to get to Temple Bar.

Long fucking day eh?
-ANkh loves you.

Train, planes and quantifying the fairer sex.

I wrote this article with Google Docs.
But it wont publish properly in blogger.
So just follow the link to read it in its natural form: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfxdtrct_10gpp2qrf6


Thanks for reading,
-ANkh

Those Mornings

To Arwen, who puts up with my crap.

-ANkh

Nipples

This happened to me on the way to work this morning... It wasn't even that cold but this girl had boy-howdy nipples!
Thanks for reading!
-ANkh

Where will you get stabbed? Google fun!

Today for giggles I googled “Stabbed in X” with X being a city where I would expect a lot of stabbings.

These are the results I got:

LA 22

Dublin 24

Limerick 30

New York 64

London 98

This is interesting. Does this mean that LA is the least violent city? Seems unlikely. Why not google “Violence in X”, this gave a whole different set of results:

Limerick 38

Dublin 91

New York 16,000

Los Angeles 35,500

London 64,900

Wow, stay the fuck out of London! But this has now shot LA far above New York… So what kind of violence do they mean? Shootings perhaps?

Results for “Shot in X” (Note: a large chunk of the response for “Shot in New York” mean film shootings. I don’t think any of “Shot in Limerick” responses meant that, so expect the results to be fairly skewed):

Limerick 45

Dublin 17,900

New York 76,400

London 96,300

Los Angeles 115,000

So there you have it: Limerick is probably a lot safer than I would have normally given it credit for. Although if you took a per-head populace count against the number of stabbings you might understand how it earned the nickname ‘Stab City’.

So google, violence, numbers and massive scientific errors. Fun eh?

-ANkh

P.S. This could be given more of a scientific grounding by using Foxrock, Beverly Hills, San Francisco or Milton Keynes at a control. But seeing as every city is a different size we’re way to far from science to make such an effort worthwhile.

Just some fun with interesting numbers. I recommend you try it out with the city you live in! Does local violence go unreported? Do alarmist newspaper columnists predict chaos? Is somebody making a movie?

Hey just wanted to point out that the character Director Boyle from the Command Conquer Series has a son named Lance.
Lance Boyle... get it?

It's inferred in Comand And Conquer 3: Kane Wrath.

I noticed.
-ANkh

My day without google.
Today, April the 1st is my day without google.
It is April fools day, but it also the day of the world-wide attempt to at least try other search engines.
My search engine of choice is yahoo.co.uk, for two simple reasons: a) it is the next option down by default in firefox 2/3, and b) yahoo! is the home of my favourite webmail client*.
So far my day without google has been quite good; I have checked all my rss feeds with google reader, read my email on gmail, routed chat and twitter through google talk and I'm writing this post in google docs.
But I have searched two things on yahoo!² Both of which were microchips used in a lab this morning.
**********
Jesus Christ the person sitting beside me in this lecture stinks! he keeps making disgusting noises with the contents of his nostrils too! Damn boy blow your nose!... actually I could offer him a tissue.
I did. He has some. He blew. I'm calm. Even the smell has gone.
**********
Anyway: I found both of the microchip datasheets I was looking for this morning, which was no great surprise.
So when it comes down to it every search engine except Windows Live Search is pretty much the same: you tell it what you want and it finds it for you³.
As far as I am concerned search engines are interchangeable, I am using firefox and will use whatever search engine is set... I may keep yahoo there, for all the difference it makes.
But that is not to say I can do without google as I feel is clear from my actions today I am reliant on google, Its rss reader is my homepage, it is among my webmail clients and one of my less popular Instant messenger accounts. I absolutely love google docs, although I do miss office functionality like sub- and super- script and headings. Also the lack of check as you go spell check functionality is irritating.
(Even more so in Ubuntu, where firefox's spell check as you type actually works properly and highlights the mistakes: which is great, but both google docs and firefox respond when you right click. Which makes a bit of a mess).

So here I am, on my day without google, using docs.google.com to write a post which I will post to google-owned blogger, then hassle my friends^ over google talk to go read it and provide some sort of feedback (or at least faint, disinterested encouragement). That done I will go back to paying vague attention to college and checking back on www.google.ie for googles annual April fools day joke.
It's quite irritating to have to wait until Silicon Valley and San Fransisco wakes up, to see the gag. Especially when I know that I pass by googles massive European headquarters on my train to college every morning.


This article is a response to this drive to use an alternative to google.

*I know the big advertisements are annoying, but generally I like yahoo, it has a nice solid feel to it, can use right-click, has infinite email storage space etc.
²If the exclamation mark is part of yahoo!'s name (and I'm fairly certain it is) does that mean I should have written it with two of them? "But I have searched two things on yahoo!!"? Would that have made sense?

³When you tell Windows Live Search what you want it finds you something different, or something it wants you to use.

^All three of my friends that I hassle into reading my new posts use google talk. You know who you are... and so do they....

One for Wonder

Leaving my house today, bathed in warm sunlight I witnessed a magpie flying majestically from a house to a nearby wall.

It was incredibly graceful, first the bird dropped: free-falling like a skydiver; then swinging out its wings swerving to aim itself at the wall.
It once more tucked its wings in with its body and rocketed forward only to deploy them again to softly land atop the granite wall.

I have never wanted to fly so much in my life, to spread my wings and show the flare with which I can command the air.
I can tell, just standing there staring in awe at this magnificent creature of the sky that what is second nature to it would be an incredible heart-in-mouth experience for me.

This, however bizarre as it might seem to the rest of the world; leads me back to the old haunt of computer games. The only way I can experience the amazing thrill of high-speed tightly-controlled low-flight is in a computer game. In fact the only place I have experienced such a thrill was fighting the force-feedback to bring a small fighter plane under control in Battlefield 2 (probably my favourite game).
The game includes a flying component which often can only be enjoyed at the detriment of the regular game-play. You could say that bf2 players suffer as a whole so a select few can enjoy the thrill of flight.
So next time someone challenges my love of computer games I will ask them in return 'How else will I fly like a magpie?'

An account of the Dublin Institute of Technology Students Union Presidential Election

Having stumbled accidentally upon democracy I stopped to watch it in action, I had spoken with all of the candidates at one time or another, Martin I had shared a campus with for a few years, Rebecca I had talked to several times after a friend informed me that I should vote for her because she wore PVC, and Al I had spoken with the day he decided to run, as he was posting his early proclamations.
I had originally decided that Al seemed an interesting and likeable character who would be worth having in office, even if only to see what he would do.
When I spoke in depth to Rebecca on the day of the electoral vote I found her aims comparable to my own, and her attitude that any vote was a good vote refreshing.
Having been around Martin for some time I know he is a frosty and stand-off-ish character who's dull outlook I do not share.
That said, this is only my opinion. A critic I was talking to later that day felt differently, he described the ballot thus: "It was like trying to choose which puddle of shit face first into".

I mingled with the crowd, gathered around the mini stage on which the votes would be counted, the candidates wore faint smiles, while their supporters laughed and joked. I naturally aligned myself with the candidates my Hunter S. Thompson addled brain had tagged as "Freak Power" candidates and their supporters.
When the vote count began the tension mounted. Where there had been pleasant conversation, now there was silence... as the vote continued it became more and more obvious that it would be won by Dunne, silence gave way to the murmurs of dark resentment. Spiky people expressed spiky opinions.
No one felt like chatting so I attempted to take notes, this had the opposite effect to what I wanted: The people around me started to ask me what I was writing, I felt unable to express to them that I wanted to have some record of how this felt, some reminder of the tension in the air or the foreboding in their faces. In the end I gave up after only three words. 'Dark dreary tension'.
Spirits were eased somewhat when the music system was restored by coiling broken wires together and hoping for the best, a Queen heavy playlist brought smiles back to peoples faces, and in an effort to relax one of the candidates on the subject of my writing I leaned back where I new he would see and noted that "Queen will never die" in my notebook. How successful this was, I cannot say.
The supporters around me had long stopped hoping for a win, and were now all but praying that the vote would at least require one recount, just to save face.
But it was not to be, when the first count was over the results were announced RON had received 92 votes, Rebecca had received 625 votes Alastair had received 480 votes and Martin Dunne had won the Presidency with 1491 votes.
There was no point in recounting the vote, Martin had simply run away with it. Martin was swept up by a group of young men and thrown in a pond in celebration.
For those who had lost, there was hugs and remorse. It was over for them. Both of them are Final Year students, there will be no further contest for them.

So a man I found painful company had been elected as DIT Students Union President.
This was unfortunate but perhaps unavoidable, as a current vice president he was a much more recognised face than either of his opponents, he was a Kevin St. student so he had dealings with students from both the Kevin St. and Aungier St. campuses. When it comes down to it, you simply cannot hope to beat name recognition.

But then what does it matter? As a friend of mine explained when I challenged her decision not to vote, in the end it makes no difference who is in power, they will all do the same things anyway.

-Ankhwatcher, Resolute Hunter S. Thomson fan.

Ponder The Adjusted

The Beast With Two Backs

Okay, so I’m very into this girl and she seems quite interested in me. Hooray.

And I can sort of feel that I am on the top of a slope of sorts. In the respect that, if I don’t screw it up through some spectacular means we are more or less definitely going to hook up. (I realise the inanity of that statement, which is to say that it essentially means ‘if we don’t not get together: then we’re going to get together’).

So now I cannot help myself but feel that I should attempt to obtain style-points.

One notion which rather stuck in my head was the concept that when we go to have sex (which could be anywhere from one day to one month from now) that I should attempt to woo her with the proposition of making “the beast with two backs”.

“The beast with two backs” is a term for sex which I encountered in the Neil Gaiman novel ‘American Gods’ (thank you Magrat, it was a lovely present), and it always seemed to me as the worst possible term for intercourse. It doesn’t seem very dirty, or exciting and it certainly isn’t sweet. So I find it utterly without merit. Which means it is perfect for gaining kudos, showing moxy and obtaining style points. So there you have it, if and when the time comes I will woo my lady to bed using that phrase.

Hopefully something like this:

“So… [I run my hand up her thigh to her waist, and then go on to massage a little circle onto her ass while I say] you wanna make the beast with two backs?”.

To be honest, if this girl lives up to my secret hopes she will reply either “No… because you’re going to take me like a dog” or “Okay… but I’m going in the drivers seat”.

Hello world, or more likely nobody.
Wow: I'm talking to the world but nobody is listening... blogging is futile. Get up and assimilate the day.

Well that asside, I have just two things I would like to throw out there.

Firstly... I just had a really weird dream, I was running around and around this sort of factory, but it wasn't quite a factory: in places it looked like a school or a shopping mall.
Anyway I was running around, and Chris was there, but he was working there. I was a patron or a prisoner, and he was a member of staff.
So I was running around and around this place, with Chris occasionally giving me directions, there were other runners too doing the circuit.
Suddenly I realised that the solution was in the milk bottle. I think I said it out loud, because I was immediately terrified that the runner behind me had heard and would get there before me!
So I doubled back, running through the halls of an empty american high school and back into a the dark grey factory, I ran up a down escallator and there it was!
It, was a large slowly spinning turnstile device, quite similar to a tie-rack. On it was a number of bottles and cartons.
I saw a volvic bottle bleached white and nearly grabbed it, thinking it would have milk in it, but then I remembered that it was bleached white by turpentine. So I looked again, and there it was! A green Avenmore carton. (This was the old low fat carton, they are now pale blue)
The carton was attached to the turnstile i such a way that I had not choice but to pull off the lid in order to get it down. I looked in, I saw and smelt that it was washing up liquid and I knew that I was right, that I had won.
I stood up (the turnstile was only at chest hieght so you had to squat to see under it and get at the bottles) and walked to the door, where I was congradulated on solving the puzzle and allowed to walk through.
At this point I was woken up.

Now the girl. Last week started on something of a high note. On sunday night I went to the movies with an attractive member of the opposite sex whom I had had my eye on for some time.
Everything went fantastic, the movie Charlie Wilson's War was great, and we had a lot of fun together. Unfortunately Ireland has an irritating habit of closing down on Sunday, so by the time the movie was over there were no pubs for us to go to.
So we parted ways at the taxi rank on Dame St. at this point I was in a frankly hideously good mood.
Then I made a big mistake, I failed to follow Swingers Rule.
Swingers Rule is from a trailer for the movie Swingers, which was at the start of one of my favourite movies growing up.
Swingers is about a man who got married young and then was divorced years later. He is trying to date again but he lacks all the necissary skills, so his friend have to teach him, talk him through the process.
Anyway, one particular scene in the trailer showed him coming over to his friends and exclaiming excitedly that he had "her number". He wanted to know when he should call her, they said wait two days, he asked how long they would wait before they would call their babys: they respond in unison "two days".
It was exactly this rule that I utterly failed to follow. I barely waited 12 hours. And that was that, I came on too strong, girl was wierded out. I acted like a twat. The end.
Oh well, next time, assuming the Universe (through quantum) grants me a next time. I'll try and play it a little cooler. In fact, a lot cooler.
Maybe I'll wear sunglasses all the time...