Why won't the voices go away...

Good evening kind reader, I hope this latest missive finds you in better spirits than I, for I am currently subject to the hellish screams of my 4 year old sister and her two similar aged compatriots. If my walls were any more bloody useless, I’d be able to see the little blighters as well as hear them.  My pains do not end there, oh no, if those were my only troubles I would have long since left the house in pursuit of calmer climes. Due to my ever burgeoning social presence, I have been embarking upon all sorts of ventures with little regard for my upcoming chemistry retakes. The day has been one long futile attempt to make headway in my studies in the face of an unrelenting racket from the out and my monstrous propensity to procrastinate, to which this particular piece belongs, from within. Pull up a chair as I bloviate about my past two weeks and aid in my avoidance of inorganic chemistry.

First and foremost, my holiday period has been devoted to two main items with most others being mere side orders in comparison; the new lady in my life and work. Suffice to say, she is a lovely girl and as such, I will not subject her to public grilling and will instead chat to you briefly about the latter. I have had the deep misfortune to be contracted for bank holidays. That may seem mildly annoying to have to work Christmas Eve, Boxing Day and the Tuesday following but it was far worse than that. I’d have settled for annoying, hell, I’d have settled for temporary blindness; what I faced was far worse. You see, my place of employ, Squiddlypib (dubbed so due to reasons explained many moons ago for those of you new here), is a retailer of cheap clothes. I work in the women’s wear department. I worked blouses on Boxing Day. Now, without sounding too misogynistic, women are batshit crazy in there at the best of times, the shear fervour that the sales had them riled into is indescribable by anyone with a sane mind and knowledge of vocabulary less than that of the entirety of the dictionary. If that wasn’t bad enough, 30 people called in sick across the store. I wouldn’t have wished that chaos upon my most hated of enemies.

My next venture of any noteworthiness came in the form of me lending a hand to a mate filming a zombie flick. Filled with dread at the fact it would mark the 5^th 8am wake up in a row, I made my way to the designated location. A few uneventful hours later due to one bastard deciding to sleep in, the filming finally began. Tasked with the role of a hapless leader of a bunch of ragtag layabouts and unlucky jerks, I gave a hackneyed performance so wooden in places, I’d have put any amateur dramatics troupe to shame. The day itself was fun, if not lengthened by the director’s lack of sufficient pre-production and went off without major incident. One mention has to go to the nippletastic top I had to wear for a flashback. Our resident makeup artist ‘modified’ a spare top with various cuts before dousing me in fake blood and dirt for that authenticity but said cuts ended up exposing both of my nipples to a load of my friends and a few people I had just met. Oh the Joy. A hefty dose of glue and a plaster later and my dignity was (semi) restored.

A special mention to my new readership, welcome to the disorganised mess that is this blog. Expect very little and hope for even less. I shall post a link to the short film when it has been completed. See you when the year count has increased by 1.

Confined 2

A zombie joke befitting my exploits

Q. Do zombies eat popcorn with their fingers?
A. No, they eat the fingers separately

My existential chest infection

Blegh... I am currently the gracious host of a particularly nasty bacterial chest infection and as if I’ve run over my cosmic yearly talk minutes, I am currently unable to speak. I’d like to say that the raspy back ally drug dealer tones, interspersed with old man coughs every few seconds is a worthy replacement but to do so would be lying. At the very least, it gives me a decent reason to avoid every day dull conversation but at the same time, I can no longer piss people off. Pissing people off is all I have... So, instead of spreading my own-brand of crazy upon the unwitting recipients of my usual inane chatter, I’ll be injecting it directly to your frontal lobe via the written word. A man’s gotta annoy someone.

Recently, I’ve been thinking through a particular philosophical problem with infinite wisdom bestowed upon me by my single year of AS Philosophy. I had planned to write it as a self contained post but then I realised that most philosophers wouldn’t want to read my bollocks, however obtuse and misinformed it may be, so I won’t subject you to 500 words of it; the topic in question is whether ‘the truth’ is subjective or objective. The main reason I started to think about all this was due to an over abundance of time during work and the fact that conclusively deciding the truth to be one way or the other will drastically change many of my other philosophical beliefs. Welp, here goes my try at chronicling my internal monologue on it all:

The first thing that must be decided is the definition of ‘the truth’. Usually the truth in philosophy is split into two forms, analytic and synthetic truths, analytic truths are true due to the definition of words, i.e. a bachelor is an unmarried man or triangles have three sides; they are true in all possible worlds. Synthetic truths are true due to the world they are in, e.g. London buses are red or metals expand when heated; if the world were to be changed, synthetic truth would change. My example for this discourse will be synthetic due to the tautological (A phrase or expression in which the same thing is said twice in different words) nature of analytic truths rendering them pretty useless. My truth will be that at 2:30 pm on the 14/12/11, I ate a kitkat. This event occurred and was empirically verified (checked by my sense experience e.g. touch, taste, sound etc.) by me, thus it is knowledge held by me and is also part of ‘the truth’. Anybody of any denomination or inclination could have witnessed the event and thus is objectively true in the chronicles of history. Let’s deconstruct this further; our new truth is ‘the kitkat bar I ate was red’, simple enough you’d think and all of my original truth could be simplified as such, now watch this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b71rT9fU-I&hd=1 – How our words shape our perception of the world, it’ll change your world view.

If the words we use can change how we categorise and perceive colour, something so basic, how else does it shape our world view? Do we only see similar things due to our similar language use? I believe that what we think to be an objective ‘truth’ or ‘matter of fact’ is simply the misnamed summary of our general consensus of similar subjective perception. This happens due to the fact that we all use very similar language categories for the world and as such, we all draw similar conclusions, yet these conclusions do not mean that what is being perceived is the truth. Others such as these African tribe’s people may have a completely different truth that is no less true than our own.

My conclusion leads to far more problems than it solves that I, with my limited knowledge and ability to give a fuck, cannot solve. If my hypothesis were to be true, something could exist and not exist due to both being ‘true’, which is a logical impossibility. Maybe it is folly to think in terms of ‘true’ and ‘false’. Who knows? All I know is that I’ve rambled enough for today. Laters, fuckwits.

Joke from my mother, she has the best sense of humour

Q. Where do alligators keep their money?

A. In the riverbank

Dear Mr Sandman, I miss you, sincerely, Mcgee

Hello dear reader, apologies once again for the extended absence, I will not patronise you with some half spun yarn of disastrous proportions (I think the previous post done that well enough), let’s just say that I am no longer away but am now very much here. The length of time I shall remain is about as long as my last string o’ sanity; dwindling and ever decreasing in magnitude. Hopefully my latest, well-strung tale will weave a string of ideas as effortlessly as this god-awful thread metaphor. Who am I kidding, this, like every other inane babble that I type down, will inevitably descend into the usual chaotic soup that I call a writing style. Whelp, here goes absolutely nothing.

To begin with, it would seem that at some point during these past few weeks, I have begun to adopt a semi-nocturnal sleep schedule, now this would be fine for a guy who could either handle a lack of sleep or had some sort of supernatural-ability granting infection (vampirism for those of you not in the loop), sadly I belong to neither. I have attempted to remedy this innumerable times, however it would appear that a combination of the universal laws of time and action packed days prevent this. Meh, I’m not fussed, I’ve adapted to a life stumbled through in a zombie like stupor. Besides, I’ve never been one to moan.

Expect this paragraph to start with a discursive marker congruent with the established form of the prior paragraph? You got another thing coming buddy. I’m sick and tired of all this coherent writing bollocks, words make far more sense when they free float in amongst the shifting soups  of the mind, feels odd to have to pin them down to paper, or in this case, electronic memory. Seem to lose a lot of their meaning on reflection. For example, squamous. The word is so fun to say that it makes me feel happy just reading it, however I doubt you feel the same. If only they could invent some form of mind-imprinty word-transfery meaning-combobulation device, then my life would be just peachy and you could all be privy to the depravities of my mind. Hey, I didn’t say it would be a good thing for you.

Finally sorted out my university application business a week or so back (from hence referred to as UCAS), it was a long old slog but now it is done, I can sit by impatiently as I wait for the decisions of my future to be decided by some far of hand of fate. I feel almost as powerless as Nick Clegg. Almost. Whilst I’m on the topic of official shit, my work at squiddlypib is going well, in fact it is going better than well, I have found my true calling in life; knitwear. The past few shifts I’ve had the oh so much pleasure of attending have seen me elbow deep in items so gaudy, it would have given the late Jimmy Savile a run for his money. By the end of the last four hour slog, I was convinced that a particular jumper was following me, that I was the crowned king of knitwear (complete with tragic back-story) and that a Bsc in Knitwear and knitwear dynamics wouldn’t be such a bad course to take. You don’t understand how much I like knitwear. Seriously.

Well, that’s enough chatter for now, I have chaos to spread and seeds of discontent to sow amongst those who trust me. Ciao <3

A joke more than befitting the mood

Q. What do you call a sheep on a trampoline?

A. A woolly jumper

Alright, I admit, that was bad even for me...

Dragon Slayer: Part 1

A thunderous howl bellows in the bowls of the distant mountains. Flashes of lightning scar the melancholic clouds as the trees for miles around quake and quiver, fearful of the torrential lashings that mother nature has seen fit to bestow  upon any and all who dwell upon this patch of verdant earth. One solitary figure rides swiftly, onwards through the rain, wind and storms. Unrelenting in his pace, his trusty steed keeping true, obediently, even through the most treacherous patches of churned up earth. Weathered and worn, a wistful gaze belying the keenness of sight and sense that the man upheld in his efforts to navigate the valley that he had found himself in.  Glimpses of far off towns and enticing hearths flashed by every now and then, whenever a break in the mountainside presented itself, calling out to the man and rousing within him a persuasive fervour, the likes of which can only be felt by those many weeks from their bed and the warm embrace of the fire. However, this did not shake the man, for he was tasked with a duty, one most grave and dire that he had forsaken any and all in the pursuit of its accomplishment. He had a dragon to slay.

It had since passed four or so hours from the time the warrior had reached the valley, his horse was tired, his eyes were weary but his will stood firm, resolute at the sight of the approaching goal. Upon reaching the foot of the mountain he had set out to find, a sigh of relief left the man’s lips, yet he knew that this was but the first step of a perilous task; the man had just stepped out of the figurative frying pan and into the all too literal fire. Dismounting, the mail clad warrior began to unfasten the various straps and buckles that had affixed the required tools to the horse. The man knew that the chances of him making it back were to slim to warrant the waiting of the creature. Once all of the equipment was rested upon a nearby stone, the man took a quick look at the entrance to the mountain face and the many stairs that lie within before turning back to his companion, “You have served me well old friend”, he whispered before giving her a few pats on her mane.

Ingesting a few healing poultices, the warrior was overwhelmed by its rejuvenating properties; he did not have the time to waste to rest up before encountering his foe.  Reinvigorated with a sudden uncompromising strength, his body now had the tenacity to match his resolve once again and for this he was glad, no room for error could be allowed , he would have one shot and one shot alone at felling this most evil of beasts. With sword and shield at hand and bow to his back, the man entered the gaping maw that marked the ascent to his destiny.

The climb was perilous, the only illumination being that of the faint glow of protruding fungi. His head was invariable filled with thoughts of those he had come to avenge; the woman who had cared for him since the death of his mother, the blacksmith who had versed him in the ways of the sword and the bending of steel, the ranger who had taught him the languages of the forest, the use of the bow and how to survive the harshest conditions and countless other townspeople he had grown to love, all slain by the beast that lounged mere moments away. A faint light lingered in the distance.

Emerging from the underground, the man was affronted by the mountains infamous name sake, its unrelenting heat. The Dragon’s Breath Mountain was well known for its scorching hot rocks and boiling lakes, it was once used as a proving ground to test the endurance of young warriors looking to prove themselves and had claimed more than its fair share of lives already. A furious sweat quickly drenched the warrior, forcing him to remove the mail cladding that had protected him from the harsh rain and winds, which now would have slowed his movements without causing much protection from the fierce breath or the sharp talons of the beast that lay, curled before him.

Having stripped down to little more than his leather undergarments and his weapons, the man moved cautiously towards the sleeping foe. The beast was coloured an onyx black that could not be compared to in all but the blackest of midnights. Its great talons digging furrows where it had decided to rest its gargantuan paws. The dragon was easily 5 times the man’s height from his perspective and to quantify the girth and overall length was beyond the capabilities of a simple man such as himself. Its curled up form was impressive enough to instil fear into the hearts of even the greatest of men but not him. Nothing could deter this man. He had lost it all. His home, his family, his village and his future, an empty void of all consuming hatred and a desire for revenge filling its place. He had no room for fear.

Becalming his heart and unsheathing his sword, the lone figure approached the large spot of land the dragon inhabited, it was completely desolate bar a number of rocks measuring the man’s height dotted about and innumerable small boiling pools encircling it . Hefting his sword high into the air, the man began to shout, all of the anger and pain within him spilling outwards with every word, “Fear me dragon, for this day shall be your last”, he proceeded to cut a large swathe out of the veined membranes that comprised the dragon’s nearby unfurled wing, causing the beast to jolt awake and recoil in pain at the sudden interruption, “You have killed my kin and for that, I shall end you where you lie!”,  he sprinted forwards into the oncoming flames, his shield held high and a throat filled with a roar the likes of which even the dragon could not outcompete.

So yeah, that’s essentially the story of why I’ve been gone these past few weeks. Skyrim is one hell of a game.

A length joke semi involving dragons to go with the mood

An 18th-century vagabond in England, exhausted and famished, came to a roadside Inn with a sign reading: "George and the Dragon." He knocked. The Innkeeper's wife stuck her head out a window. "Could ye spare some victuals?" He asked. The woman glanced at his shabby, dirty clothes. "No!" she shouted. "Could I have a pint of ale?" "No!" she shouted. "Could I at least sleep in your stable?" "No!" she shouted again. The vagabond said, "Might I please...?" "What now?" the woman screeched, not allowing him to finish. "D'ye suppose," he asked, "that I might have a word with George?"

Damn, I don't half talk some bollocks, don't I?

Good evening dear reader, it would seem that although I am finally at liberty post without the nagging of a guilty conscience to abate my progress, I have been struck dumb by the deft blow of a sudden wave of tiredness and as such, am not really in the mood to post at all. When I say guilty conscience, I’m actually referring to the constant nagging of various teachers and tutors for not finishing work. If there’s one thing I hate more than work, it’s the insufferable whinging of fools. Therefore, I rushed a rough version of my university statement to a level that, I’m told, is worthy of a final draft last night. Proceeded to finish an entire half season of Torchwood in a few hours, in order to negate the spoilers of a friend’s future theories on Dr Who. Meanwhile, I learned a whole load of bollocks about David Hume for philosophy, benzene rings for chemistry and photosynthesis for biology, all in the last few days. There are group-of-30-somethings based sit-com plots less tired than I am.

Hence, instead of the usual half-hearted attempt at a semi-informative-but-ultimately-pointless piece with a hefty dose of sarcasm, I will be nailing down a few choice pieces of advice/clichés that I most often dish out. If half as many people listened to my advice as the amount of people I complain to about the fact that people rarely listen to my advice, I would have an incalculable number. Not because it would be particularly large or anything, I’m just rather shit at maths.

McGee’s words o’ wisdom

1)   If you are reading this, you have no reason to be bored. Only boring people and those at work are bored. You have the internet, learn to use it.

2)   You are not depressed; if you were you wouldn’t be whining about it in a desperate attempt for attention.

3)   Knowledge is power. One misplaced fact can lead to a person’s downfall. Only reveal to those you trust and even then, only what is absolutely necessary.

4)   Pain is temporary; emotions fade over time. Never act out of emotion as rarely goes well.

5)  Every cliché has a nugget of truth, otherwise they would never have been repeated so often as to be classed as clichés.

6)   A well placed joke can diffuse any tense situation.

7)   Stop worrying so much. Unless your actions can have a direct effect upon an outcome, its fate should be of no consequence to you until you know it in certainty.

8)   Always try to understand your enemies. To understand your foe is to understand with absolute certainty whether your disagreement is one of principle or misunderstanding.

9)   Life is absurd. Do not assume it owes you anything, or you, it.

10)   Morality and terms such as “good” or “bad” are ones that are banded about by imbeciles and used by the ignorant. They are completely subjective and have no actual use, other than dividing groups arbitrarily via social constructs.

11)   A person is smart, understanding and open to reason. People are stupid, prone to conclusions and have a tendency for tribe mentality.

12)   Learn a person’s habits and you will know the person.

13)   Many of society’s most upheld and orthodox laws/views are based on the mythos of a bygone age. Do not hold what is widely thought to be sacrosanct to be the absolute truth.

14)   The key to persuading another is to make them believe that your views are their own. Plant the seeds of doubt within their mind, watch them blossom as they realise your point of view was the correct one all along.

15)   The key to winning an argument is not to persuade the opponent that you hold a truer opinion but to persuade them that you are right; do not argue that strawberry is better than chocolate, argue instead that we should all be able to choose which flavour we please.

16)   Do not plan. Ever. Set goals and constantly work towards them by whichever means are the most successful at the moment. A plan is made to be foiled.

17)   There is no such thing as failure, only a lesson yet to be learnt. You learn much more from failing than you do through being successful.

18)   Read up on philosophy if you can. The world would be a much more understanding, albeit, confused place for it if more people did.

19)   You are no better than any other human on earth. No matter how good you may be at pissing into the wind, it does not make you a better person as a whole than anyone else. Someone will always be better than you at whatever it is you think you are good at.

20)   Choose your words wisely. Your words are the shades of your vocabulary that will allow you to paint either the most beautiful picture or the crudest scrawling upon the mind of another. 

Joke because I’ve been told it should be shared with the world. Received it off of my philosophy teacher:

You know Greece is having its economic troubles at the moment; the sales of taramasalata and humus are way down.

They are afraid of a double dip recession.

I will not make a sex related pun, I will not make a sex related pun, I will not make a sex related pun.

A lingering fog of self-inflicted tiredness (decided to watch a film into the early hours of the morn), coupled with the lethargy following an excessively unhealthy takeaway (when I say unhealthy, there are North Sea rig disasters that spewed less oil than some of that dubious meat), means I am not currently on top form. Then again, most of my posts as of late seem to be accompanied by excuses as imaginative as the average reality TV show executive, so I doubt it’ll bother you too much. The reason I’ve decided to undertake the mammoth task of regaling you with the tale of my recent endeavours as opposed to leaving them for a day unencumbered by maladies, is that I am in one of those rare procrastination fuelled moods that spurs me to disregard a week’s worth of missed work and instead, spout more inane bullshit on this sorry excuse for a blog.

To cut an excessively long story to a length that might almost be manageable, I shall abstain from filling you in on every goings on and shall focus on the points of importance. In other words, my abysmal memory prevents me from telling you the whole story. To think that me, Mr. Amazing Memory of all people, could forget the majority of the goings on of a week. My incompetence never ceases to amaze.

After a surprisingly uneventful journey, that is, one of the few in which I didn’t get hopelessly lost along the way, I arrived in the sleepy country town of Foxton, just outside of Cambridge. Wandering about the platform, I quickly found another guy who looked about as hopelessly lacking in bearings as I. We made our introductions and proceeded to follow, in a rather stalkerish fashion now that I think about it, a group of girls who looked to have some sort of heading. They eventually lead us close enough to the place, Villiers Park, that a quick phone call had us unpacked and ready to make awkward small talk in no time.

I must say, for a bunch of people looking to do a week’s course on cell biology and genetics, they weren’t half as bad as I thought they’d be. Admittedly, they could all be secret nerds such as me but it certainly didn’t come through in the following week’s worth of conversation. I don’t think you could ask for a more funny, balanced and jovial group. It’s just a shame that this fact did not make itself apparent until the final few days. Then again, I suppose with that curse upon us all that is Facebook; I’ll still be receiving their general inanities and indirect messages when my hair is grey and my face has all the smoothness of a deflated balloon.

The course content itself was top notch, albeit quite tiring. Early starts and late finishes with a lot to keep you busy in the precious few hours you did have to yourself meant that you barely had enough time to think about relaxing, let alone doing any.  The information that was dispensed to us was amazing; I’ve learnt more about the genetics and epigenetics of cancer and various other diseases, inherited and otherwise, than I could have ever hoped for. There were also a few outings which included a trip to the Sanger Institute, where they decode gene sequences , they also decoded 1/3 of the human genome, working in tandem with various other labs to complete the whole task which took a total of 13 years to complete. Amazing place filled with great minds. A similar thing could be said of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, which we visited a few days later. There I was privileged to undertake experiments in the full garb, look at Bacteriophages (bacteria infecting viruses) down an electron microscope and model proteins on a PC in 3D.

All in all it was a very valuable trip, one that reconfirmed my wish to pursue a career in science. One speaker at the Sanger Institute who is attempting to compile a database of proteins and their families spoke about how when he figures out things about a protein, such as their structure, he is the only man alive, ever, to know that information. I want that someday too. I am now resolute in my decision to make a career of science even with my mediocre aptitude for it, rather than to fritter my life away in any other number of, most likely more suited, ways. What’s life without a little challenge, eh?

A biology joke that is bad enough to enter my personal repertoire to go with the mood,

Q: What is the fastest way to determine the sex of a chromosome?
A: Pull down its genes.

Congatulations! You've made another trip around the sun.

I must apologise up front for this one, it will be a little muddled (read: A complete train wreck of different ideas), the reason for this being that I am short of time at the present moment. It all started nearly 18 years ago, 07/09/1993 to be precise... and that’s pretty much the story. For those of you who did not get my most perspicuous explanation, I shall spell it out for you in layman’s terms; at the time of writing this there are but 25 hours between me and full-fledged adulthood.

Aye, it would appear that through some fluke, divine intervention, stroke of luck etc, I have managed to survive to the age at which I am legally allowed to vote, buy shiny, new knives and be legally tried as an adult. Thinking back on it, I really should have got more hardcore criminality in while the getting was good. Oh well, I guess a life of petty illegality will have to suffice. Speaking of petty illegality, I’ve increased the frequency of the drinks to mark this supposedly joyous occasion. Specifically, I had a surprise gathering of sorts organised by a friend yesterday, next to the London eye, a rather muddy patch of grass to keep us nice and damp. It’s a shame I never employed the line “You are 100 years too early to trick me” because unbeknownst to them, I actually knew about the whole thing for a rather long time. There is nothing quite like watching your friends scurry around you in secrecy, rather poorly I might add. A choice line that I received in the form of a text, completely out of the blue might I add, was “Do you like jam?”. Now, I’m no expert on sweet tasting spreads... Wait, who am I kidding? I love the stuff! Particularly strawberry jam, oh and you can’t forget marmalade, lemon and lime is to die for... but I digress; this would have piqued the suspicions of even the most dim-witted of fellows. It was about as tactful as knocking me out with a rock, dumping me next to the eye and shouting SURPRISE!

Apart from drinking, I’ve also had to contend with the looming sword of Damocles that is the rapidly approaching college year, specifically concerning my complete lack of preparatory work. Anybody that has known me for more than a week knows I do as little work as possible for maximum effect, therefore, if there is a chance I can glide into the next year and bullshit my way through the first few weeks, I’m all for it. Let’s just hope my assumptions (unlike all the ones before it) are correct.

When the sun rises, I am forced to return to said place and commence my induction. I think it involves brainwashing and the taking of DNA samples, I can’t quite remember. Either way, it seems more trouble than it’s worth; a necessary evil in the loosest sense of the word.

Also, I thought it’d be prudent to inform you that my work at Squidlypib is slowly improving. Turns out that the environment has a fair bit of favouritism and I seem to be getting on well enough with those in charge to not be put on the dreaded reduced section at every available opportunity. Folded t-shirts for about 3 hours last Saturday, it was surprisingly relaxing; almost meditative. Should be receiving my first paycheque at the end of the week as it happens, wonder just how fast I can piss my hard earned scrapings up the wall. Me thinks that my liver will be on strike the end of next week.

Before I make another extended absence, I felt it proper to tell you that I have a residential course at some arse end of the country all of next week, therefore I will most likely not  post between now and then but never fear! I shall make the first post back so juicy with gossip and goings on that it will be indistinguishable from the convoluted plot of the average mind numbing soap opera. Stay tuned people.

A joke in celebration of the occasion

Q: Why couldn’t prehistoric man send birthday cards?
A: The stamps kept falling off the rocks!