An essay on hacksaws, blowtorches and angle grinders and their superiority to RPGs.

Some of you might have managed to make out the true story of what happened the other week with my car which resulted in me driving around with ducktaped lisence plates until last Saturday.

As I see it there are benefits to being in Canada with a problem like this. I recounted the story to the church in Smith Falls (about an hour south of Ottawa) last Saturday carefully leaving out the mention of guns and ninjas for the sake of some of the weak hearted elderly members. After delivering some orotory genius mostly stolen from my dad I entered the masses hoping to discuss the topic of the sermon.

It's a silly thing to do I know, it rarely happens and when it does you realise that the person you're discussing it with either wasn't listening or somehow managed to relate it to their pet dog. Regardless I went with this small hope given that we were planning to do some door-to-door ministry and I wanted to get some volunteers. I got three volunteers, the first had a hacksaw with which they were confident they could get the rusted bolts off my car.

I knew they couldn't, it had already been tried and had only resulted in much cursing (of the Christian nature of course things like "Nghhh!!!" and "Raghh Fffffff... friggin' frig frig frig bolts ffffuu... ragh!") Regardless I then turned down this offer. Then there was the guy in a cowboy hat, he appears on occasion at church with one of the most amazingly thick Fu Manchu moustache. He happened to have a blowtorch in the back of his SUV.

This was turned down for a number of reasons: 1) It's a blowtorch. 2) He's was wearing a cowboy hat. 3) His moustache looked mighty flammable. 4) I'm incredibly messy and clumsy at everything I do, that includes refuelling the car - in this case I connected the dots...

I didn't get another offer till I went to my elders house for lunch, dinner, and chilling by a lake (he lives on a lake - the picture is from the just outside his house, they're some stairs leading down to it on the right; it's very cool and I'm incredibly jealous.)

After having to retell my humiliation to those there (including Tom who is a police helicopter pilot who goes around looking for marjuana plantations.) I got my final offer from the elder (John) - an angle grinder (the angle grinder's not called John the elder is, though the grinder might be called John; I forgot to ask.) I accepted this offer given that he also had bolts to refix the plates and so I now have my plates beautifully bolted into the car with only minor body damage.

It is important in the conclusion of an essay to summarise one's arguement and explain the ramblings. The hacksaw was superior tot he RPG predominantly because the officer wasn't holding the RPG properly, firstly he was holding it in one hand, and was consequently not properly braced, secondly the RPG in questions was clearly second rate, looking awfully like a flimsy pen-knife with a screwdriver attachement. The blowtorch was superior because blowtorches are cool and make fire, now RPG's are very cool and make bigger fire but I refer the last part of the hacksaw arguement to augment this case. In conclusion this author argues the angle-grinders are the coolest because they come served with delicious salmon, a lake, good company and actually worked.

Sirens

I was supposed to be starting some door-to-door ministry Sunday just gone, and I was also giving sermons on both the Saturday and the Sunday. So, having wrestled vainly with my malfunctioning computer, I departed on the Sunday with three half-printed sermons (all different sermons) and some misprinted tracts and questionairres. The church I was speaking at was over an hour away and I had had about 3-4 hours sleep max the night before so it took me about ten minutes to realise I was driving the wrong direction in my recently purchased car.

Disclaimer:
The story you are about to hear may include some Hollywood dramatisation, as such any reference to guns, explosions and ninja grandmothers should be thoroughly disregarded.

I sped up, intent on reaching the next intersection, turning round and coming back. It was at this time that I saw the flashing. To clarify, the flashing I mention here has nothing to do with trenchcoats, in fact such flashers fear this flashing. It was the blue and red kind. The kind of flashing that makes a patriotic American, Englishman, Frenchman or half-Scot half-Canadian man's blood start to pump faster.

Instinct had made me pull-over, the desire to obey the law of the land, blend with these alien people had become strong. But I had alot to lose here, people were counting on me... good people... Christian people. I glanced in the rearview mirror, my hand shivering over the ignition. The colonial magistrate had exited his cruiser, his hand resting lightly on his hip, his pistol loose and in it's holster. I glanced back at the dashboard clock, time was counting down. My eye's flickered nervously from the mirror to my Bible resting on the seat beside me, my foot rested lightly on the gas pedal. The officer was at my window, the moment of opportunity was gone.

His revolver tapped lightly on my window, I pressed the button to roll it down... nothing happened... The officer stepped back bracing his desert eagle .50 in both hands, shouting rough demands.

I turned the ignition.

The car burst to life, engine revving, music blaring... now window would roll down. I looked down the top of the barrel of his shotgun, no hint of fear in my eyes.

"Officer...?" My voice was calm, like a leaf on the wind.

"Sir, I pulled you over for speeding, you were doing 77 in a 50 zone." His tone spoke volumes, polite and unassuming, he was going to play with me.

"Is that so?" My voice was smooth like well blended instant gravy.

"It is."

"I see."

"Quite."

"Indeed."

"Lisence, registration and insurance please." The lawman gestured expectantly at my glove-compartment with his sub-machine gun.

"I only have my license..." My voice was gritty and gratting, like Horatio Kane having just arrived at a Crime Scene and put his sun-glasses to the corner of his mouth.

"I see."

"Yes."

"Quite."

"Indeed."

The officer tipped the top of his hat with his M4, glanced around for possible threats then headed back to his cruiser. The minutes were like hours. I could see the time trickling away. The good people... Christian people, crying out in anguish in my absence. The officer returned to my vehicle, and rested the end of his sniper rifle on my wing mirror.

"This your vehicle?" I nodded at his question, it didn't deserve a spoken response. He nodded to himself before continuing, "How long you had it?"

"I registered it three days ago..." My voice was rough but forceful, like a gorilla choking on bamboo. The officer pointed with his flamethrower.

"Those your plates?" I thought about reaching for my Bible but knew I wouldn't make it before he had his gatling gun pelting round after round of cold hard lead into my body.

"No... I haven't had a chance to change them* since getting this car, they're rusted on." My voice was deep and rumbling, like a herd of howling wombats stampeding at dawn.

"I see."

"Yes."

"Quite."

"Indeed."

"Driving with the wrong plates requires me to tow your vehicle and issue a five-thousand dollar fine, sir." He pursed his lips while I suffered a mild heart-attack. Then he wandered around to the front of the car and tapped at the plates. He took out his RPG and fired off a few rounds, the explosion killing a passing elderly female ninja... the plates however, didn't budge. He came back round to the front of the car. "Tell you what I'm going to do, I'm going to get you towed, but not to the pound. I'll get you towed back home where your car will stay until you get those plates sorted. Some sort of small nuclear device should do the trick, I'm raiding some terrorists with the lads later on this evening and I'll let you know if I get one. In the mean time though I have to give you your speeding ticket along with tickets for failing to surrender your insurance and registration documents..." The officer took a breath and levelled his plasma cannon at me along with a meaningful stare, "We clear?"

I woke up in the ER in time to ply off my plates with a hammer. Duck-tape on my new ones and give a 1 and a half hour late sermon. The End...


*License plates are assigned to the people not the cars in Canada...

Re-Resurrection

I want to say I've been busy, and use it as an excuse but apparently lying is bad. While I have been busy at times I have had ample opportunity to natter away to my adoring masses on this blog, however every time I've come to write something on here I've drawn a blank.

I've been helping out at a Youth camp for the past week, being a counselor for a dorm and helping with the canoing. Here I passed on my years of training in cynicism and motionlessness to the happy campers under my care.

It was a good camp, they kept the schedule light and flexible which took away alot of the stress I have had with other camps. The weather probably averaged around 35C most of the week yet somehow I managed to make it though without any sunburn (I would like to give my thanks to the person who invented "staying indoors" for this reason.)

In a stroke of genius I forgot to bring any footwear except the sandals I wore on the way there. One of these decided to rebel midway through the camp and had to be subdued with masking tape, thankfully the other learned from it's fallen comrade.

Here are some visual aids to this no doubt mesmerising story:

The Camp Weather Station:


Vital to any camp the Slave Shack can accomadate a minimum of 50 underfed slaves within it's walls:


One of the slaves injured themselves during the course of the camp, here he is on his way to be put down, for the sake of the environment his body will be recycled to fuel the boiler in the camp, the camp director and staff will have hot water for a few weeks now.

As many of you no doubt know slavery is a pretty controversial topic, especially in colonies like Canada. However I like to think that at the camp we were able to see past the propaganda, lies and bad press that slaves have received over the past few decades and embrace the slaves into our community without forcing them to conform and become free people like us.

Finally for good effect I leave you with a picture of a rebellious sandal, rightly subdued as it sits in awe of my presence. It dreams that one day it will unite all other sandals in a great rebellion against the human oppression, but for now it lies, masked and idle on my floor.

Shift

There have been some comments via email about the photo in my last post. The picture is not edited, it is the main parliament building here in Ottawa. I have no skill in editing photos, something that is close to being the unforgivable sin in the gospel according to blogging. But then again up until a few months ago I didn't have even have a digital (or non-digital for that matter) camera, accordingly I flaunt these blogging laws as heretical, to be burnt and destroyed.

Unfortunately the only way to burn and destroy the idea is to kill the people who have it, which at first only seems like a minor inconvenience until you consider that once the idea has been passed on to you, however much you might disagree with it the idea will continue to live on in your sub-conscious mind, festering like an open wound in a blocked garbage chute.

Work continues to take up nearly all my time, however I've successfully managed, with the aid of this post to avoid doing virtually any work today. I'm starting to develop a conscience on this matter however (I believe the scholars call this behavior a 'work ethic') and ended up doing at least some work even though I had planned this as a proper day off.

No photos today I'm afraid, I do have some but can't be bothered fishing out the cable to connect my camera to my computer, so next time... maybe...

It's a Frassled Life

I've had some complaints. It's a well known fact that lack of blogging is a sign of lack of love and is excusable only when love is being displayed elsewhere.

Well to reassure all you people who fear I've ceased loving them: not even 30 minutes ago I bought a percolator. This is an obvious sign of love to my flatmates who don't really like coffee. To further emphasize my love to them I've also made it easily accessible by placing it by my desk in my room.

I have no recent pictures to put up here because frankly Ottawa is pretty ugly in the spring time. The snow's melted leaving a very bleak, dead and waterlogged landscape. Instead I decided to include here a picture of Glasgow Uni with a Canadian flag:


Life has been pretty hectic, I need to write an article for a local Newspaper advertising our church and make it interesting (our Church is very interesting but I'm not sure why, it just is - like chipmunks.) I also have to write a biography for my Church site, so far all my attempts have been excessively flippant, cynical and verbose which as you all know is quite against my nature. As with all things I blame this on Andy Simpson and my new percolator.

I'm also giving a sermon this week and have to prepare the first proper study for Christianity Explored for the Sunday. Did it Sunday just gone and it seemed to go reasonably well, showed a clip from Talladega Nights (the Baby Jesus prayer) as an example of the preconceived images people have of Christ. At least three non-Christians (wait that's un-PC so: Seekers, Heretics, mundies, Earthlings, pick yer poison) in attendance along with quite a few members, not what it was designed for per se but doubtless still worthwhile.

The percolator was a bad idea, I've got a stomach ache, I'm having trouble blinking and my hands shaking. It occurs to me now that my tea is decaf and the coffee I bought for this isn't, which means having gone cold turkey on caffeine when I got to Canada I've just had 4 cups of intensely strong coffee... one more can't hurt though...

Sugar Rush

I finally did it, I have done what no person has done before - I've made it further than any other settler. And I have proof! Here we have the remains of the last settlers to make it this far:


I moved into my room in the townhouse I'll be sharing with three other guys. So far eveything is good with two exceptions.

Firstly, I know what those settlers died of; a heart attack or kidney failure brought on be extreme cases of type 2 diabetes. From what I can tell everything here copious amounts of sugar. I got some "pure" orange juice, that along with a piece of cheese here makes me feel sick from the ensuing sugar rush (a sugar rush for me usually means feeling sleepy without being able to get to sleep.)

I've also started to suffer from dehydration as the flat members here have committed the most unforgivable of sins:

It took about two hours for me to start ransacking the kitchen for items of interest, my self-restraint up to this point had been incredible - I'd even properly unpacked. Entering the kitchen, as is often the case, was a pleasant experience. Birds started singing in the trees, somewhere a child was born, and in the distance children were playing happily on the highway. I started opening cupboards, sneering at my new house-mates noticeably grease free choice in foods and distinct lack of neeps.

I ate one hundred and eighty-six grapes (the six really small ones didn't count) and tested out the fabled Oreo and milk combination, however just to keep you on your toes they put salt in the Oreos instead of an extra serving of sugar. In the back of my mind, as I continued my innocent and idle filled activity, an anxiety was building. As I went from item to item and browsed my fantastic selection from the most expensive shop I had ever done the anxiety started to crescendo.

My eyes scanned every inch of the kitchen, my heart started to beat faster and faster. The birds turned out to be vultures and hadidas, the newborn babe a gross three eyed alien bent on world domination, the children on the highway... well their fate was inevitable really.

There was no kettle.

A brief, hope-dashing conversation with my landlord and house-mate Merlin confirmed this.

I cannot live in a tealess world... my project for tomorrow is clear.

A Tealess World:

In Loving Memory

Fraser Scott Henderson

Born 14th December 1983
Died 4th March 2007

"He thought God called him to Canada,

and God showed him otherwise."

Obituary: Fraser Scott Henderson (MA Hons)

The nation is in a state of shock today after Fraser Henderson, the hero of Brixton Valley died today. Fraser is succeeded by a black squirrel (picture below) found feeding near his crisp cold body. Commenting on his untimely and tragic death Prime Minister Stephen Harper had this to say:

"This has been a tremendous loss for Canada, but we must not just look to ourselves, the county's hearts and thoughts are with Fraser's family at the moment.

Though he was only with us for a short time we have no doubt of the contribution he would have given to this nation. It is with a heavy heart that I present this monument to his greatness. Just like him it shows potential, and just like all his hopes and good intentions have now melted away, so too shall this monument."

His death has sparked fierce debate as to whether tourists or immigrants should be allowed to enter within five hundred miles of Canada during winter. Canada would be the third country to bring in this rule after it came into effect in Russia just last year and Hiati followed suit just two months later.

Squirrel Henderson III

O Canada

I've arrived in Canada and have already been forced into hard labour.

I had to shovel the snow off the driveway, which given the snow had a very high density of ice means I can no longer fully clench my left hand... or breathe...*

It took me only 20 minutes with immigration at the airport and another 10 minutes in an office in town (with no queues) to be registered with a Social Insurance Number (same as an NI number) and be legally permitted to work. I'd esimate the same information and process would have taken no less than 4 hours followed by a 3-5 week wait for the number to be sent out to you.

Below is a picture from the bedroom window of the room I'm staying in at the pastor's house over here. I know you all can feel the tingles of excitement at seeing my first ever web-published digital photo... get a paper bag, put it over your mouth and breathe normally.


I'll be sure to update you more on my more** exciting life with hopefully wittier posts in the future.

* How am I alive you ask? That you need to ask the question merely shows your ignorance of basic biology.

** More exciting than a couple of days ago where I spent the entire day playing World of Warcraft, though this point is heavily debatable. Also more exciting than YOUR life, this point isn't debatable; you're breathing, I'm not.

Wheat Thins and future Fratricide

The along waited wheat thin tribute has arrived: Christina bought me Wheat Thins and sent them from the US for my Birthday to stop Jon from eating them like he did the last batch.

Wheat Thins rock, Christina Rocks, Gavin who ate three quarters of them knowing it was my birthday present does not. Jon only ate one batch of wheat thins but gave me the other... so he kinda rocks.

Skinnydipping, theivery and Canadians

No doubt you have already managed to see many links between the three title components to this entry. Indeed worldwide these three things have been closely associated, the Canadian Skinnydipping Pickpocket Championships being only one of the reasons for this association. And of corse the fact that 'Canadians' ends in an 's' and we all know what that refers to.

Casting aside any Tarrentinian urges I shall convey this tale both fair and foul in chronological order.

Some time ago, I gave into a wee bit of Divine prompting I had been resisting for some time and sent an email to my church in Canada asking if they had any positions I might be able to fill. I had been resisting this call not because I didn't want to go but because I didn't think anything would come of it.

Regardless, as an opening to our stage I received an email from our Canadian Church offering me a position in Ottawa, that I have since accepted. From this point on the story becomes sordid and rife with intrigue and drunkards.

As with any story that includes questionable content, Andy Simpson was involved in leading many innocents astray. In this instance he led an innocent, if tipsy Jonathan into flamboyent displays of the flesh. (Much like he led myself and a small flock up a hill in order to sprain ankles as one might recall.) This rampant display of two raunchy backsides was thankfully masked by the night and, briefly, the sea.

This happened at a time when the rest of the party who went to Coldingham for the new year, were stolidly standing around the fire, talking about many edifying topics and choking down any vomit caused by the cheeky sight in the distance. Regardless of this dispicable, deplorable act that decimated the moral of many present, the New Year came without a hitch and much happiness.

Meanwhile... in Manchester, my brother left a party infused with fire water. Unable to drive he decided it would be wise to leave the car unlocked while he took a taxi to another friend's place. When unlocked the door locks stand a good two inches high, proclaiming the car to be decent loot. In the boot of the said car sat an X-Box 360 I had bought for Christmas along with £300 worth of associated equipment.

I'm getting bored of writing this - it was stolen. The end.

(But it's ok he bought me yogurt to apologise.)

Why you should refuse primal urges at 1am

I sunk to some timeless depths of depravity on Sunday night by spending time with Andy Simpson, I know some of you might be calculating what level of hell that's likely to take me too already but it's merely a beginning of a spate of evil doings.

Firstly we entered a pub, something everyone knows is worse than drowning three innocent puppies though a little better than drowning twelve innocent kittens, when you place it on the moral puppy/kitten scale. To draw myself in deeper I then had an 'ale', a drink for those of you unacclimatised to anything but the purest spring water or wine*, that's likely induce people into trying to fully implement Jonathan Swift's 'Modest Proposal'.

I understand Andy to have had a 'whis-key', him being somewhat more morally dysfunct than myself.

It is not surprising consequently that in our inebrieated states; after half a pint of ale and a sip of whiskey, Andy proposed we go hill walking and I, among others who had shared my half pint of ale, agreed. I'd like to add I thought it a stupid idea at the time, a stupid idea going up the hill, a stupid idea coming down, and I especially think it was a stupid idea now.

As is the case with most of my hill walking experiences I never actually walked up the hill, at least according to Andy's standards. (In my opinion I had walked up two hills just to get to the hill in question and was consequently a bonefide veteran hill walker.) Me and a like-minded sensible person decided to take a snooze at the bottom of the hill, with my carefully concealed pack of wine* gums, while the others continued up.

They never went up to the top of the hill in the end so, by Andy's logic he didn't climb any hills and by mine I climbed two. Regardless the point of this tale comes in the descent of the first of two hills we had climbed, when - doubtless in punishment for prior and present Andy consorting - I fell and sprained my ankle. I hobbled to the car with Mr Grierson propping me up and made it home an hour later. At which point I stumbled into my flat out of breath from hopping up two flights of stairs and woke my brother up by falling over twice due to my flat being almost impossible to navigate even with two healthy feet.

He guessed that I had been punished for Andy consorting without me mentioning who I had been with while hill walking at 2am in the morning. He insisted on taking me to A&E in case it was broken. It wasn't and I'm pretty sure they woke up the doctor who saw me, he had a fatigued "If I'd been on that hill I'd have finished you off" kinda look to him, much like my brother, and the nurse took great pleasure in watching me limp around unassisted.

The moral of the tale is simple, never give in to primal, Andy-induced uges past midnight, especially when you're supposed to go to work the next day.

On a another note stealing is bad.

*Wine Fact: Jesus made wine for a feast 2000 years ago, He made so much of it that the drink can be acquired to this day in local stores - the most valuble and oldest of this wine has congealed creating the precious 'wine gums.' Capitalist fiends have exploited our Lords drink to this day making people pay for what He freely gave, unlike TV evangelists.

Possibilities

This is how I intend to handle those awkward clarification conversations with female friends in the future.

I finally got some work to do at my job, it livens the tedium of my job just enough mean I won't be finding excuses to miss work for a week or two. Plus which someone who I'm pretty sure is my superior within my company asked my permission to do something which tickles me a little.

I'm thinking I need to do a poll for the next job I do to see what people think I should be doing with my future. Naturally I will profusely ignore the result of this poll, but you can be comforted by the knowledge that sub-consciously, human need for acceptance and a desire for you to buy me food at some point in the future will mean I'll probably give it more credit than I should. I can't be bothered working out how to set up a proper poll however so you'll just have to vote by comments.

So here are the options of work I could try to pursue over the next 2-3 years as general life experience prior to any future ministry (salaries directly relate to how many coffees/meals I buy you all over the course of these jobs):

1. Hobo (30-40k per annum)
2. Police Force (20-32k per annum)
3. Social Care (13-20k per annum)
4. Education (11k-33k per annum - support not teaching – maybe next year for the latter)
5. Modelling (138,386 per annum + ad contracts)
6. Civil Service (11-14k of your tax £'s per annum)
7. Soap Box Preaching (20p per/hr – unless snapped up to be a TV Evangelist in the first week)
8. Toy Boy (180k per annum + good food)
9. Tedious Admin Jobs (14-22k per annum + suicidal urges + £1.2 million worker compensation for the 'faulty chair' that slit my wrists + the enlightenment of a near death experience)

I also need to say that my brother is no longer addicted to computer games and resents the fact that I haven't mentioned this earlier as he hasn't been for a month and a bit and won't be until November. Yay.

A Pleasant Pause

I feel like I'm feeding all my work into a black hole at the moment.
From what I can tell the primary reason I lack work is because every time I run something by my boss I never hear from it again. If I print off the work I'm currently on and then hover over him asking 'have you read it yet' every two minutes he might look at it with morbidly glazed eyes and then spitefully scribble over it in red pen before handing it back to me.

Admittedly he's obsessed with a major project we're on but even work relating to this disappears when I send it to him to be reviewed.

I got in trouble for using the internet at work. I have nothing to do and have consequently spent many days reading through random articles on wikipedia and re-reading what web comics I can access with their site restrictions. Unfortunately the head of division's office is right by my work station which means that when I spent an entire week earning tax payer money by reading webcomics he thought I was sitting staring at a screensaver I'd downloaded all day.

It's a fair point really, if they're paying me to sit and do nothing all day then I really should be doing nothing to the best of my ability; not ducking out of a hard day working at nothing by doing something. I'm quite good at doing nothing at home, or on the bus or during my breaks but not at doing nothing at work – it suddenly becomes an exceptionally difficult task. An example of this is happening right now, I'm writing this at work, which given I still work just out side the division head's office is risky business.

I would consider placing my Bible in some easily read yet concealed position but unfortunately I bought a Bible that has size 6 font making it incredibly difficult to read without peering very closely at it. I've also found that reading your Bible at work is the worst kind of witness – it gives off various signals like; "I'm holier than you!", or if they're also reading a Bible; "Did you notice I'm reading the New King James Version, I'm holier than you!" and in response to a comment from your colleagues; "No I didn't notice I was reading it upside down, it's er… in Hebrew… I'm holier than you!" It also hints that the reason you do no work is because you're reading your Bible, therefore accentuating the perception that Christian's are slackers, which lets face it is unfortunately, usually true.

This does not apply however if you've been a good evangelist, in which case they all know you're Christian and any activity you do is necessarily hypocritical and holier than thou, even drinking your afternoon tea. (Given I bring in loose tea courtesy of Mans Felt, with my own strainer they may be justified with this belief.)

Anyway, the obvious solution is to be a ninja Christian. The key to ninja evangelisation is to gospelise people on swift and stunning blows, that way they don't realise that you're a Christian until they're converted and, by that time, join you in your ninja quest.

Hidden Life

My brother's addicted to a game at the moment - it makes it hard to ever write something on my blog because he's always in a raid with 40 other people who'll be "let down" if he were to let me use my computer. I can't rightly complain about this because I used to use the same logic to prevent my dad from kicking me off the computer when my parents stayed with me for a few months last year. However it has put me in mind of a conversation I had with George yesterday concerning the corporate side of computer gaming. I was trying to justify the creation of computer games, argueing that some companies actually made the games for the pleasure of the games and not the money. Among the companies I attempted to defend was Blizzard the creators of the game my brother is currently addicted to and the game that almost resulted in me failing my third year of uni.

I got home and one of my favourite webcomics had this strip - the game here is referring to the Blizzard game too which my brother is addicted. It is not exagerrating in the slightest - I have gone through 28 hours of solid gaming with only a biscuit and a cup of tea to sustain me, and no toilet breaks. In the past this wasn't an issue, the basic premise was, I buy a game; I complete the game within a 48 hour period having bought with the game two pints of caffeine of any variant and a large pack of dorritos. Once this 48 hour period has ended the game is only 75% likely to be replayed in the next four months. Subsequent replays of a game rarely take more than a few hours as well. With Blizzard's World of Warcraft however, as with other Massive Multiplayer Online games the addiction is subject to a minimum of 4-5 months solid addiction, with the possibility of losing up to three-four years of one's life in any given game. Somehow I'm finding it difficult to maintain the justification that there isn't something inherently evil about computer gaming.

This is a concept contrary to everything people have taught me regarding things not being inherently evil only used for evil - we know this simply isn't true when we look at atomic weapons and hard drugs but why does it cease to be the case when we apply it to daytime television and computer gaming. There is no doubt in my mind that I have an addictive personality - I find the same solice in comics I do in computer games yet I do not percieve these as a similar avarice. Perhaps it is because I would estimate that I have spent between 15-25% of my life so far playing computer games, a decent percentage of that World of Warcraft.

Today my brother realised his computer was not in fact broken (having assumed it was broken for the past three months). He found this out by turning it on funnily enough something we hadn't tried for those same three months. While this meant I could have done some web research, read other people's blogs and generally check my mail and stuff my instinct was instead to resubscribe to World of Warcraft (£8.99 per month) and login. For the first time in my life I didn't enjoy computer games, I was and am depressed that I even spent the hour I did on them. It made me want to flee. I'm really hoping I won't look back... and for that matter remember to cancel my subscription.

On Joy

I’ve been considering the Chritian Union ball on Friday night; the banter, the dancing the general glimpses of joy contrasted with comments made to me from members of the Edinburgh University CU that a ball was not within the mission statement of the Christian Union.

I had an great night wearing my pyjama’s/dress/Cameroonian chieftain’s outfit and enjoyed the pleasure of a 5 am finish and 9 am start for breakfast with some of the more hardcore ball-goers, combined with chilling in the park and again a good meal. In all it was almost 24hrs straight of social revelry (the good kind.) And I was struck by the assumption that this kind of celebration – provided God is acknowledged and worshiped in it, which He was - could ever be contrary to any Christian Organisation’s (Church or not) mission statement.

I just finished reading Mark Buchanan’s excellent book Your God is Too Safe and in the concluding chapters he talks of the importance of celebration: not the 'we should always be celebrating God and worshiping Him at every moment of every day' type of celebration but the full fledged cracking out the music and dancing, and experiencing God’s joy. He points out that there are 60 references to celebrations of God’s people in the Bible, only two of which are negative. He also points out that “Exodus, Deuteronomy and Numbers reads like a string of invitations to a non-stop whirlwind of festivals.”

Joy is a required discipline of the Christian Life, C.S. Lewis’ literary devil Screwtape describes it as an acceleration of the rhythm of the celestial experience, quite opaque to us. Opaque not because they don’t understand it as Lewis puts forward but because they have turned their back on the experience they once had of it in God’s presence. We are constantly in danger of turning our backs of the glimpses of joy God blesses us with because we think them indulgent or misleading.

But these gatherings of God’s Children, regardless of the previous mission statements and goals are glimpses of the joy of heaven, and it was for the joy that was set before Him that Christ endured the Cross*, and likewise it is those glimpses of joy that spur us heavenward towards the upward goal in Christ Jesus – they should never be underestimated.

* Hebrews 12:2

The Gall

Having considered a number of other blogs it has come to my attention that the primary requirement for a blog is an unwitting element of pretension. While the humblest among us might attempt to avoid this with self-derision or a decrease in intellectual or jargon based content it is my intention to avoid this by removing the unwitting aspect of the pretension. The pretension comes from the delusional belief that we have a right to voice our opinion and the sudden realisation that we actually have a means to do this as well. True our audience might only be a few friends and some sad people typing random stuff into Google but our voice is heard nonetheless.

I would first and foremost like to point out that I have no authority to air my thoughts in the echoing halls of my empty site, I have no right and so far no overly novel opinions or eureka moments to share that are of any worth to anyone within the acknowledged clique that will read this. Only the means to ramble and the will to do so motivate true bloggery from my eductated* position on the matter.

So the question I pose is not so much is blogging a waste of time because we're all well aware that nothing that draws attention to people as wonderful as ourselves is ever a waste of time. Nor is it whether reading blogs is a waste of time that would then render the creation of blogs a waste of time and to that I would reiterate the above point. The true question is if pretension and egotism were to be removed from the event would that decrease the amount of cynicism I could direct at these practises?

*I've read at least half an article on about five other blog sites.

Incompetence

Apparently I’m a website coordinator for the GUCU website. Theoretically this shouldn’t be news to me, I vaguely remember being told this, possibly even volunteering for it much to my amusement about a year or so ago. I find it even more amusing that I have only just discovered this because I found out when, for the first time in a year I actually posted on the forum (I left after the Fingers, Andy and Qwibble clique were pushed off their/our ranting turf many many moons ago, to be replaced by… well never mind.) I find this new/old identity of mine an entertaining prospect given that I am probably the only person to ever fail the uni IT Basic Competency test - A testament to why you shouldn’t assume you’ve attached the right file while engrossed in My Name is Earl.

Finding myself in a position of authority for which I am entirely incompetent fills me with one of those elatory tingly feelings. The resulting empowerment has given me the delusion that my opinions, thoughts and considerations are of some sort of importance. You might argue that I have always had this type of empowerment but there are rare times of clarity when I see the truth of it and have console myself with a long rambling daydream or simply a look in the mirror. This time however I’ve decided to start a blog because of the lingering effects of my irrelevant authoritarian position insist on placating the primal human desire for even our most inane thoughts to be heard.