BenPaddon.co.uk

Twistori is a social experiment that uses Twitter as its basis. I adore it - it’s probably the best thing I’ve seen done using Twitter since The Good Captain.

Congratulations to both EA Games and Activision for failing utterly to be inventive or original with your advertising. I mean, honestly. How much are you paying your marketing teams? Because you’d be better off investing that money in, say, a big hole.

Let’s imagine, for a moment, that you’ve been charged with the task of building a Robot. Let’s not worry about the Whys and Hows of this scenario, only that this is your job. You are going to build a Robot for Some Guy, and that’s pretty much all you need to know.

Oh, wait, one more thing. You’ve been told where to get the parts from. There’s Some Other Guy. He’s a pretty neat guy. You get along. You have shared interests. The problem is that this Other Guy is also providing parts for about nine or ten other people, so he’s not always able to get your parts straight away.

Now imagine that Some Guy, the same Some Guy who asked you to build the Robot, comes up to you to ask how his Robot is progressing. Well, you can’t answer him, can you? You don’t have the parts. It’s out of your control - Some Other Guy pretty much has the monopoly on Robot Parts, after all. It’s entirely out of your hands. You can learn how to build the parts yourself - that’s an option - but it’s going to take time. This Robot isn’t going to be finished any time soon. It’s annoying, but it’s out of your control and it can’t be helped.

“No,” said Some Guy. “You’re supposed to be building a Robot. Why aren’t you building a Robot? You should build me a Robot.”

So you explain, again, that you can’t get the parts. Some Guy doesn’t seem to care that you can’t get the parts. You’ve already got some of them, after all. He asked for a Robot. He should have a Robot. Where is his Robot?

It’s times like this, I’m sure you’ll agree, when you’ll wonder why you even bothered getting a job in Robot Construction.

When I went to San Diego for Comic-Con last month I was lucky enough to find some great accommodation at a perfect price - free. Michelle and David were happy to put me up, even though they were in Europe for the first two days of the Con. They were very much there for the weekend though, and we had a fantastic time hanging out. We were all thinking the same thing - “Why don’t we do this more often?” - to which the response is “Well, what’s stopping us?” Last Monday (the 11th) happened to be Michelle’s birthday, and she planned a karaoke night on Friday. So on Friday I went into work for three hours, and then hopped in a taxi to Burbank Train Station and, from there, caught a train to San Diego. Twice in the space of a month. Crazy, eh?

What a weekend, though. Karaoke, Tropic Thunder, Rock Band, and spending time with people I don’t see nearly enough of. I just wish I could do it every weekend.

Perhaps the nicest thing one person can say to another is, “Have you lost weight?” And it’s something I’ve been hearing on and off for the past month or so. Michelle asked me if I’d lost weight when we had lunch back in July about a week or two before Comic-Con, for instance. A couple of people at work have commented on it as well. Most recently was this weekend, when Michelle flat out told me that I’ve lost weight.

After months of not really looking at myself in the mirror for fear of what I might see, I had a proper look last night before I went to bed. And I was not as disgusted as I expected to be.

Now I’m sure there are people out there who’ll think to themselves, “But Ben, you’ve always been very tall and kind of thin. Did you really put on that much weight?” - the answer is, “No, probably not.” I put on a noticable amount of weight, but I’m not gigantic. I just started to get a bit of a spare tyre around the midriff. The last two times I’ve gone back to visit family in England they’ve made a point of constantly reminding me that I’m a little tubbier, though, with Westy in particular making a very conscious effort to crush my spirit and leave me an empty husk of a human being (his excuse was “If I make fun of you it’ll motivate you to lose weight,” which is bollocks). Similarly the first thing my Mum said when I visited her back in March was, “Oh my word, look at the size of you!”, which was… well, not nice. In fact the only person to say anything nice about my physique was Patrick, who said I had broader shoulders (which was probably a more polite way of saying “You’re fat,” but he was nice about it so I’m giving him points anyway).

It’s another example of England making me feel inferior, and playing on my insecurities. I’m better than that, and I’m going to prove it.

I’m reading Andrew’s latest blog entry, in which he does a spEak You’re bRanes on the comments left on this Times Online article about Richard Dawkins. Mostly he’s having a pop at some of the more stupefying comments left by the Intelligent Design crowd as well as various stupid people who believe in some kind of Big Beard in the Sky* who feel that Dawkins’ unwavering belief in the non-existence of God is somehow wrong and that he should be cast out of human society, possibly even beaten and/or hanged in the process. It strikes me as particularly ironic that these are usually (and evidently) the same people who harp on about respecting the beliefs of others.

One commonly occurring argument that seems to be popping up there, however, basically boils down to this: Believe in God and Heaven and Angels and so on, because we don’t know if there is or there isn’t so you might as well just in case. Besides, how will children react when you tell them that there’s no Heaven? Where will all the calculators go? Best not to have to worry about that sort of question - tell them about Heaven and God and everything will be alright.

That’s a bit of a shitty argument, really.

The fact is, regardless of whether or not there is an afterlife of any description, these people are pretty much choosing to believe in an afterlife purely because the alternative - that when we punch out at the end of our shift we’re not coming back - isn’t pleasant enough for them. It’s like choosing to watch The Care Bears Movie instead of The Empire Strikes Back or The Dark Knight because it has a more upbeat, pleasant ending despite being a crock of shit.

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*Not to imply that all religious people are stupid, of course, but rather that there is a small subset of religious people who are incredibly thick. You all know the sort of person I’m referring to, here. I feel it’s probably fair to point out that Atheists can be stupid too - I’m a prime example of this.