Sticks And Stones

We all know the phrase that my title tonight gets its name from, you know the old wives tale "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me" it's a really well known phrase like; "It's raining cats and dogs" or "Come on mate, it was one time, with your wife, it didn’t mean anything, I mean sure she’s pregnant and its not yours... wow actually that must suck for you, well I’m off to screw your sister hem bye!". But also like the other 2 sayings it’s all complete and utter bovine faeces. I mean can you imagine it raining cats and dogs? if that were to happen then that implies that all water in the world is household pets and would mean that everyone, and not just David Blunkett, would have to shower with a Labrador (well how else is he going to find the soap?). It’s a preposterous idea.
The harsh, hallowing truth is, words are mans biggest weapons, well apart from nukes, or Chuck Norris. Entire nations can be seduced by a well constructed sentence, entire wars have been caused by one mans vocabulary, or lack of in one particular, recent, weapon of mass destruction searching example.
But anyway I have a bone to pick with that phrase, is it not true that you are taught it from a young age, to try and “thicken your skin” so to speak, so that when you get older and people begin to insult you about everything you do, say or are, you’re not as badly affected? If it is so efficient then why when you make a small girl cry, and she goes running to the playground assistant and you run up chanting “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me” you get shouted at and told “this is no excuse for a seventeen year old, now please leave the school before we phone the police.” And barred from the local primary school?
There are two reasons for this; one, parents are liars and will tell you anything to stop you complaining about your brother saying that your head is weird and two, words really do hurt, and when used correctly (or incorrectly) they can make a bad situation worse.

Ok, not strictly an example of making a bad situation worse, but more of a bad situation a bit more confusing. You may have remembered a few weeks ago, I had to attend a funeral, well, this was my first funeral and as we approached the grieving partner he asked me “Is this your first funeral then Joe?” and before I could solemnly nod my head my mum butted in and says “Yes it is. UNFORTUNATLY”
Ill gives you a moment to think about that... what in the world possessed my mother to add that bit on the end? What’s unfortunate; that I’m 17, and it’s only now I have to face a coffin? Because I’d say that was pretty good, in fact I would say I’m somewhat of a LUCKY person. Or is it unfortunate that this funeral is my first one, because that sounds a bit undermining and is not really the best thing to say to someone about to say goodbye to their loved one “well, I understand that you’ve lost your soul mate but you could have put some effort in, I mean really, think of my son, this is his first experience of admitting to the fragility of life and this place is a dump!” needless to say with all this running through my mind, I had no time to be sad, I was too busy being confused.

Ok, so I’ve explained how peoples choice of words can be idiotic and sometimes life threatening (“I read sharks don’t like meat, apparently they prefer tofu”)
But words are brilliant, they can be picked out of sentences to get the real meaning, one word can change the entire perceived denotation of a sentence. Like when someone starts a sentence with “Ok, Hypothetically...” this can be translated as “Ok the situation I am about to ask you about has just happened, it’s bad and I have just done it, I’m asking for your advice so that I can part some of the blame on you and feign ignorance” or when someone shouts out at a party “TUNE”, this can be translated as “I’m a complete moron and shouldn’t be allowed to breed”

One word use which I never understood, is when people tag “actually” onto the end of a phrase, such as saying to a Italian chef; “yeah, that bolognaise was quite nice actually” or saying to The Who (pre deaths); “Well actually that concert wasn’t bad”, or to a hesitating murderer; “actually I’d prefer not dying tonight, I have dinner with the girlfriends parents”. It’s admitting that before the event you had apprehensions about the quality of it, or doubted the person in question, whereas in reality, you wouldn’t have doubts about a top chef cooking a kickass bolognaise and chances are you do quite like living. I don’t know if you have any experience with the word “actually” but to me it was introduced by my family, mainly my mother. I don’t know why, perhaps things were just more surprising back then.

But my favourite use of language is something even I’m regularly guilty of. It’s what I call “delusions of self importance” It may sound like a complete knock off of “delusions of grandeur” and that’s because, well it is. Basically it’s a term I invented (I hope) that is to be used when someone uses a word that isn’t needed in a sentence, when another, more regular, down to earth word is more appropriate, like whenever I don’t want to sound like a “blogger” and say this is an “article”, it is really not an article, but by saying that, not only are people more impressed, but it makes ME feel better, and also makes other people feel inadequate, “Oh man, I wish I wrote articles.” You can hear them thinking. But it’s also used by the wider world, when they say something which makes them seem more important, if you’re observant you’ll realise he is only helping himself, not anyone else and probably feeding an oversized ego. Like I said, I’m very guilty of this. Though I would like to quickly add that this isn’t the same as when someone uses a higher register word, because chances are they are just better educated, or a pretentious tool.

Joe Strange

Gets to tick his chart today because he used “grandeur” in a sentence.

Life Offline

Today I'm going to be talking about something that is new to oh so many people on the internet, and that's life without the World Wide Web, or a computer for that matter.
Briefly I would like to say again sorry for not writing a proper blog last week but details can be found down there about the reasons for the blogs absence.

So, over the last few weeks (2 perhaps, maybe even 3) my visits to the computer screen and the large variety of websites I frequent have dwindled, and at some points I didn’t type anything or even turn on the screen for days at a time. But it's fine now, my computer is closer now, and most of the redecorating is done.

at first I thought it was strange not being at my desk a lot, at any possible time I would fire up the Acer and check my emails, but as I grew more tired from work and other "components" to my... rehab, were introduced, I found the need for MSN, Cracked and even this little website called face book (it's not very big, I doubt you've heard of it) dwindled away to almost nothing, causing me to fast the internet (not by all accounts of course, my Xbox live account still maintained a good workout.)

I don't know if you can put this down to laziness or me realising I don’t have to be refined by the shackles of technology, but I soon gave up the need to be at the computer at all, even breaking a vow I made to myself at the beginning of this blog of writing it once a week no matter what. Normally I would return from work of a day, go down into my room and "log on" but over this period, I didn’t have a computer in my room to log on to, nor did I have to go "down" into my room, since my new room is adjacent to my front door... Yeah I’m going to put it down to laziness.

But life offline has been actually pretty fulfilling, and isolating in equal measures.
for instance, for a brief time last week I had one of those social life things, I took it upon myself to come out of my hibernation state on the days I wasn't working and met with real life people, even enjoyed a movie, and then on Saturday, one of the most social events I've been to in a long time, (well since the last one) in which I went to a concert and made a new "friend" or 2. Granted with my lack of mobility and lack of time due to my heavy work hours (7 hours overtime on my last payslip) I did have to resort to technology to organise these things, but then hey, I never said I was going to be a techno-hermit. That itself conjures images of a beardy tramp raving to some Drum and Bass, and that my friends is not going to happen to me. It’s also allowed me to really relax (if you can call moving anything anywhere relaxing) when I was tired, or stressed, instead of whining to a friend and causing some aggravated tension over a screen I merely lay down on my bed put on the radio or a nice calming CD and relax for half an hour. Then I'd go to work because I realised I had fallen asleep and it was 8:55 the next morning.

But Apart from the slight change in a few social events, I think I can safely say that I prefer life online. I wired it all up last night, so I’m about 18 hours into having a computer and I’m already feeling the benefits, much like a junkie who has got a fix after being in rehab, except I’m not addicted. Yet.
Ok, so I don’t know how big a commitment you readers have to the internet, how many websites you “frequent” or how often you like to update things, in fact why don’t you leave a comment and tell me? But with me, I tend to have a few websites which are updated daily which I like to have a look at when I can, this takes from half an hour to an hour to do, a day. So as you can imagine after not really paying much attention to the internet for a few days, I had a whole lot of catching up to do, unfortunately my websites seemed to have updated more than usual and now I have a general feeling of being out of sync, and not just with the sites, with my friends. I don’t suppose any of you do the old trick of checking people’s statuses or PM’s to see what’s going on, but a lot of my friends have things I know nothing about. Now I grant you that the areas I know nothing about far surpass the areas I know a bit about and dwarf the areas I know a lot about (this really only includes comedy and converse, oh and harry potter. No shame there I suppose) but it still came as a shock, it’s similar as to when you go away for a holiday and come back and 2 of your friends are now seeing someone, or broken up or someone’s got an I phone, you know, really significant things. But it’s not all loneliness and cluelessness. For instance I am soon to be sort of replacing my current, loyal and all round good guy creative MP3 player (apply named Steve) for an IPod, so to prepare for this huge transition (when you rely on music to get you through your day as much as me, its not a choice that doesn’t need preparation) I have changed my media player from well, Media player, to iTunes, now before this me and iTunes had some, how the street kids call, beef, in the way I never understood anything it did ever. But know it’s sorted me and him are best friends, he even found me the 2nd Lazlo bane album, making him my super mega new best friend.

So in all, the internet is good, but as with everything, especially steak it should not be over done, or underdone.

Joe Strange
Never realised how many times I use a first person pronoun in my blog, it must make me sound very self obsessed. Well I know better.

This Weeks Entry.

I am only flying a visit by Blogger today, just to explain the absence of the blog this week, I haven't been able to A - find the time to write one over the last few days and B - had the will or energy to write one.

As I may have mentioned, I have recently been moving rooms, with my possessions scattered throughout the house, and I took a "Vow" not to move my computer into the room until its fully painted, unfortunately painting is taking longer than I thought, but I'm breaking my vow after today and moving it in tonight after the "main" wall is dried. the lack of a computer in my room has taken away the liberty of "Oh, ill write the blog now, or at least start it, Oh no, something less productive is on TV" So that's reason 1

the second reason is that i have been uncharacteristically working all the time for the last few days, this has left me without energy or motivation to do much at all, but after a "re energising" day yesterday and less hours in line for work next week, i should be recovered and ready to write again on Tuesday. So that's the second.

the third and most harrowing reason is as follows, 2 weeks ago a friend of mine, and the families, died in a motorcycle accident, it came as a huge shock to us since he was still young, and, to me, he was pretty damn invincible. But his Funeral was on monday, and surprisingly i was better than i thought, until Tuesday, when it hit me and i was mentally drained for the day. so that's the third reason.

So, I am sorry for the lack of humour and a proper blog this week, but schedule resumes as normal next week, with a new batch of activeness!

Joe Strange

I realise i had A and B as the first reasons, and 3 sections for reasons, but, i also included two reasons in A and B, cos I'm crazy like that.

The Art Of Passivity.

This week’s topic actually has an ironic twist to it, which is brilliant because I finally got to use the word "irony" (or its variations) in a blog.

So! Passivity is the action of well... doing nothing at all, so it isn't really an action, more of a state of being. I say this week’s blog is ironic for one reason (I would love to say 2 reasons, but there is only really one) You see, today I nearly didn’t write an article because I was tired, a bit ill and in all fairness wasn’t doing anything productive, so one may say I wasn’t doing anything. So I was being passive, and then I realised that you can think about so much, realise so much and achieve a brilliant mind set by just sitting there.

Ok, I here some of you saying, “Joe, you handsomely witty fiend, you have a computer how can you be sat there doing nothing with the entire internet in front of you.” Well I recently thought it would be a good idea to move to my large, hot, blue bedroom to my sister’s old slightly smaller, cold and red bedroom. I know it sounds like a down grade but it; is closer to the kitchen, means I get my own bath/shower and is further away from the end of the house where the parents live, and so when I come home at night I don’t need to wake them. It also means I get to re-realise how much of a bastard my bed is to put back together and take apart is, oh and there is painting to be done which means music, a stereo and a paint roller, and yet another question of my sexuality (I’m up to 9 confirmed inquisitions)

So, where was I? Anyway we are about halfway through the moving process, and as previously stated I have moved the bed, drawers and a desk into the room, along with most my clothes and the most important belongings. But my computer still remains in my old room.

This means that I have been detached from the PC for a while, it’s been good for me, it means that I have rediscovered old joys, like reading not because I am on a train or bus, but because I’m bored. Earlier I was listening to the second series of “Mark Watson Makes the World Substantially Better” and just lying on my bed, it was the most peaceful (if you excuse Tom Basden’s lovely singing) I’ve had in quite a while.

So this got me thinking, when was the last time you sat down, or lay down and did nothing, just stared and thought? For me, it is the few times I forget my MP3 when I go to college and just sit on the bus and stare out the window, it’s really very thought provoking and can lead to some amazing observations and insane cognitions.
And I know in today’s society everyone has to be doing something or else they just feel like they’re “wasting time” similar to when people walk into a high class expensive shop and go “Oh I feel like I’m spending money just by standing here” and you cant help but think to yourself... Yes mother, you’re at the till. So instead of just sitting there spending time, or wasting money, get a nice relaxing album, I propose Jack Johnson (if it helped me fail my GCSE French Oral it can help you relax.) or a book that isn’t going to make you ponder the meaning of life, like maybe pick up a harry potter that you’ve already read or the bible. At this point I would discourage any autobiographies written by sports figures, since we are trying to relax the brain not destroy it with dull-ness, the same reason I would not advise reading this blog for this exercise.

And I’m pretty sure that this sort of “stationary progression” is more useful than busy bodies would have us believe. This spark of inspiration, and ultimately what lead to me actually keeping a weekly deadline, came about from me doing nothing. This small little thing came about from me not using the internet for a couple of hours when I could have easily abandoned my lovely new room and ventured into the new “store room” and played mindless games for 120 minutes. Now think back to Edison, or Da Vinci, I’m pretty sure they didn’t have the internet back in “their days” so therefore we have to assume, and assume correctly that the reason they were such brilliant people was because they sat around and did nothing all day.

Joe Strange

It is proven that evil masterminds such as Hitler and Jack the Ripper also had no internet, therefore sat around and did nothing, so it works for brilliant geniuses and evil masterminds, laziness is a 2 way street after all.