Apathy Sketchpad

I am posting here to alert you to two shiny new websites. The first you may already be aware of.

Jump Leads is Ben Paddon’s new project. Well, I say “new”. Actually it’s about a year old now, but it’s just starting to really Go Places. He’s had the concept for a year or so, and he’s been writing it for about as long, but only recently has he found an artist to draw the actual comic. So the website will launch on the 6th. There are a few ‘episodes’ written, each of which will update one page at a time like a comic syndicated in a newspaper. These have been written variously by Ben, Euan and myself. I hear Friz is also officially on the list but hasn’t actually finished anything yet.

The second website is Channel Flip, which is Friz’ new project. (I have refrained from linking to Friz’ website since it appears to have turned into pornography, presumably after he let the domain lapse.) It describes itself as a satirical TV blog. It has updates from Friz, Paul, someone called Joey and myself. It updates rather more, and officially launches on last Friday.

As well as these, you can (hopefully) still cee me here and on RealVG. I just can’t stop blogging.

Recently, there has been a lot of talk about excess packaging. Cardboard sleeves and the like, but mostly supermarket plastic bags. (Someone called the “Carrier Bag Consortium” are angry about this, saying it will cost jobs, but then, so would closing a kitten-burning facility, as long as it employed someone. Yeah, I know, I didn’t know there was a “Carrier Bag Consortium” either.)

But really, if people are that bothered about shops selling disposable tat, the first thing to ban would be the promotion I saw in Superdrug a while ago:

Buy a pack of razor blades for your re-usable razor, and get a free razor.

From the Manchester University postgraduate accomodation guide:

You should also note that if you require accommodation from September the closing date for applications for accommodation is the 31st August.

How am I supposed to get anything done with restrictions like that placed upon me?

Here is a letter from today’s Metro about the recent and rather silly reports that the moon makes people go crazy and commit crimes:

In response to J Rafai — as babies, we are abaout 75 to 80 per cent water and, as we grow older, this percentage decreases until it is reduced to about 60 to 65 per cent for men and 50 to 60 per cent for women.

The human brain is about 85 per cent water and out bones are between ten and 15 per cent water. If tides are affected by the lunar cycle, why shouldn’t we be?

A Brito, Essex

Okay, let’s break that theory down, shall we? This seems to be the logic:

1. The sea is affected by the moon.
2. The sea is mostly water.
3. We are mostly water.
4. Therefore, we are affected by the moon.

Right. Okay. Let’s see what else we can prove that way, then…

1. Birds can fly.
2. Birds have legs.
3. I have legs.
4. Therefore, I can fly.

1. Stephen Hawking is a genius.
2. Stephen Hawking is sitting in a chair with wheels on.
3. I am sitting in a chair with wheels on.
4. Therefore, I am a genius.

1. A Brito, Essex is mostly water.
2. Dave Hitt is mostly water.
3. Dave Hitt is a twat.
4. Therefore, A Brito, Essex is a twat.

Gosh, would you look at that. I don’t think A Brito, Essex is going to like that much, but he/she shoudln’t argue with me because I am a genius and I can fly. Now I realise that technically what Brito said was “so why shouldn’t we be affected”, which means that he might mean that all he’s saying is it’s possible. But then, what was the water argument for? He could say “once, I ate a curry, so how does that prove we aren’t affected by the moon?”. But that would be even more stupid.

Ultimately I just don’t understand how someone can misunderstand science to such a degree. Really, it’s barely even science. It’s just outside reason. It’s practically mathematics. I shudder to think how A Brito, Essex operates from day to day if he/she thinks that way. It must be impossible to get anything done. “Oh no,” A Brito, Essex presumably says, “I can’t find my keys. But it’s okay, because I’ve found a ringpull on the floor, and that’s made of metal, so logically it will unlock my door. I hope burgulars never realise that.”

I’ve heard there’s a thing called “Web 2.0″ and apparently it involves a lot of clever design work. I don’t know or care what exactly it is about “Web 2.0″ that makes it better than, or even different to, the old thing (which presumably was “Web 1.x”), but either way it’s time I made my own WordPress skin for this site. So here is my design, which I’m rather pleased with: Read the rest of this entry »

The Irish Lottery

…

Dear winner,
This mail is to bring to your notice that your email emerged as one of
our winning email address in our just concluded Irish Lottery Board
sweepstakes programme that made you automatically a winner of the sum
of £750,000.00(GBP)
Please note that your lucky winning number falls within our European
booklet representative office in Europe as indicated in your coupon.
In view of this, your £750,000.00(GBP) will be released to you by
any of our payment offices in Europe.
Our European agent will immediately commence the process to facilitate
the release of your funds as soon as you contact him or her.For
security reasons, you are advised to keep your winning information
confidential till your claim is processed and your money remitted to
you in whatever manner you deem fit to claim your prize.
This is part of our precautionary measure to avoid double claiming and
unwarranted abuse of this program. Please be warned!!!
To file for your claim, please contact our Claims Agent and fill the
payment processing form and send it to our claims agent immediately.

…

Yours faithfully,
Sir Kolyn Perkins.
Online coordinator for THE IRISH LOTTERY
Sweepstakes International Program.

I didn’t even enter the Irish Lottery. There’s a joke in here somewhere…

Seriously? Two Ls, one D, a slanty vowel and a circle. Not since Travis and Texaco both went with a red T in a white star on a red circle have there been two more similar logos.

According to Alexa (that is, Alexa.com, the web statistics page, not Alexa my old housemate), my website is currently ranked number 2,802,305. Now I have no idea if that’s good or bad, but I do know that Alexa also says in the last three months its rank has improved by 1,362,007. So if I can keep that up, then in three months I’ll be ranked 1,440,298 and three months after that I’ll be number 78,291. That’s pretty good. But at this rate I’ll be the most visited site on the Internet in six months and 5 days. After that I’ll break though the barriers of Earthly popularity and into the bizarre but intriguing realms of negative rank. I trust you’re all suitably excited.

Personally, I don’t have much faith in Alexa. It measures all traffic by users of the Alext toolbar, and that’s a fairly skewed subset of Internet users. It’s probably alright for big sites, but even then it’s not ideal. For small sites, the numbers are utterly meaningless.

Wikipedia still holds their word as gospel, though.

Here are, I swear, the actual, genuine screens telling commuters what trains are arriving at distant platforms at Manchester Oxford Road railway station. See if you can spot the unnecessary portmanteau word.