Warlach’s World

15/05/2008 - The LOLs Prayer

Originally uploaded by Warlach

The LOLs Prayer

Our Cat, who art in ceiling,
Hallowed be thy LOLs.
Thy cheezeburger come.
Thy wants be done,
On floor as it is in ceiling.
Give us this day our daily Noms.
And forgive us our do not wants,
As we forgive those who do not want against us.
And lead us not into curiousness,
But deliver us from basement cat.
For thine is the cheezeburger,
and the bucket,
and the LOLs,
for evers and evers.
Kthxbai.

Awful day at work, at this point I’ll pray for relief from whoever will listen. That is all.

10/04/2008 - The Silence

Originally uploaded by Warlach

We’ll call this a sequel to The Scream from last Wednesday - while that consisted of me static in a spinning world, here we see the opposite.

It feels like it’s been a much longer week than it actually has, and I’ve been running just from appointment to appointment to appointment.

Maybe I’m channeling our fearless leader K. Rudd on his world wide tour?

As someone who reads three papers, at least, per day, and spends the rest of the time on the net and Twitter, it’s clear the story of the minute is Kevin’s Chinese speech.

All in all I think that it’s pretty mild, compared to what could be said, but it does seem that we are one story away from reviving the ‘yellow peril’ mantra.

I’m not saying I see war with China as unlikely, just that the rhetoric, through this story and the ongoing Olympic torch relay protest saga, seems intent on framing China as the other, blurring the line between people and their government.

Besides, as a comedian once said, "There’s 2 billion Chinese. They could kayak over and put a good fight."

But for now I, and the world, just keep spinning…

07/04/2008 - Subpar: Eat Flesh!

Originally uploaded by Warlach

Another day where a quick, cheap sandwich from Subway seemed like a good idea, and another day where I left the store baffled and enraged.

(Please stand by, this rant has been coming for awhile.)

1. The smell. Why must it smell like you’re drowning in the breath of a thousand toddlers who have each returned from the Easter Show? Worse still is when you realise the thick, sugary scent is caused by the bread, so laced with crap, that you may as well make your sandwich between two Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

2. The ingredients. You know what, I don’t care how fresh it is, if it’s been sitting all day in the sweaty little tubs, it’s no fresher than something Maccas defrost 30 seconds before you order it. I’m not saying Maccas is good, but let’s not lie to ourselves.

3. The carrot conspiracy. When they came for the beetroot I said nothing because I wasn’t a beetroot eater, but now they have removed carrot from the menu. Where will the madness end? I say we will go this far and no farther. If not for your own toppings, but for your children’s, and your children’s children’s toppings. When you reach into your friends sandwich and it’s a pile of lettuce… Forget it Jake, it’s Subwaytown…

So, arise ye lunchers from your slumber, arise ye prisoners of take-away, together we’ll raise our plastic forks and at last ends the age of Subway!

*ahem*

4. And the final grievance, the cutting. Every single time I go to Subway, and get a foot long sub, I ask them to NOT cut it in half. Every time they smile and nod, and every single time the very next thing they do is cut it! I know this is a small thing, really, but this draws of up the wall more than anything else.

*Sigh*

It feels so much better to get that off my chest!

It is indeed a mad world. Today, in a tribute to Ira Glass and the amazing brilliant This American Life podcast, I present three acts on the theme of madness:

Act 1 – Known Unknown

Since long before The Matrix I have questioned the reality that we see presented to us every day. While I accept the cooler, science fiction possibilities – that we are merely programs in a simulation or that, taking into account neoteny, that death is merely our next step as part of evolution – I find it more interesting that I am not of sound mind.

The other day a friend laughed at a particularly bad joke, showing a meek, small smile, and immediately I thought that perhaps weeks (months?) earlier I had been in a horrible accident, left childlike and brain damaged to the world around me, while reality, as I see it, is my brain trying to compensate and make sense of broken stimuli. Has my girlfriend, sitting opposite in the restaurant at the time, become my carer? Instead of a bad joke had I merely mumbled “cheese!” and drooled on myself?

Perhaps this blog is me writing in faeces on the carpet, who can know, although I find it hard to believe I’d imagine myself using a Dell. Does everyone who is nice to, or talks to, me merely pity the shell of who I was?

This is what keeps me up at night.

Act 2 – Unknown Known

My second thought is of a less life altering nature.

Being a man I am compelled, if not required, to use urinals in order to relieve understandable body functions. However, it is towards the end of the process that I find myself in a bind.

Remember the Seinfeld episode where Kramer realises he doesn’t know how to shower quickly and eventually goes to a public shower to get hints? This is along the same lines.

At what point do you get taught how to ’shake the snake’? Toilet training was decades ago and while I’m sure some basics may have been imparted, just like with driving, bad habits are bound to creep in. It’s an act men do every day without any guidance: there is no way for men to discuss and improve the technique, no ability, for example, to say that using the ol’ Konami code has been helpful:

Don’t ask about the B and A buttons…

Just to be clear, I have no problems in this area, I don’t think I’m lacking, just that it bothers me that I could, perhaps, be better at something I do so often. What do other men know that I don’t?

This is what occupies my mind while I try to work.

Act 3 – Beyond Knowing

The final act today concerns issues beyond my own private psyche: have you head about the Moose toys, called Bindeez, that contain Fantasy (GHB)?

In an age where the world is up in arms over lead paint in Mattel’s toys, this seems like an ever so slightly larger oversight, especially now that it’s put children in hospital.

Either this was an oversight, in which case it’s gross negligence, or it was, as some are reporting is a possibility, a deliberate act, in which case it’s horrific.

Something that Keith from Keith and the Girl is often heard to say is that people – doctors, lawyers, toy makers, whoever – are just people. Every profession or group will contain the inherent quota of incompetence and bad people. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see which type of person caused this.

I still don’t know what to think of this last piece, so, when talking about recalled toys, I leave you with this: