My Plan to Date Taylor Swift

We all know that Taylor Swift loves her break up songs. If she ever got into a successful marriage her music career would be over until the divorce and then BAM! Straight back up the charts. Do you ever wonder what he ex's think of having a song about them? Do they feel a little bit of prestige? Like "yeah, that song on the radio is about me. I'm just that important." They might feel a bit insulted because they're being shown in a negative light in a song but for me I'd find it hilarious... I'd love it. I wish I could break up with Taylor Swift just so I could get a song about me.

Well I was listening to Taylor Swift on the radio when I heard her latest song...

You don't know about me but I bet you want to - 22 by Taylor Swift.

That's when it hit me... how to date Taylor Swift is simple: pretend you have no idea who she is. See she has a lot of fans (well, duh) so approaching her and telling her you enjoy her music won't distinguish you at all. Sure, it's a nice compliment, but it is generic. What I would do is approach her like any other girl (actually I'm too shy to approach girls but let's pretend I have both the charm and social life to confidently walk around bars) with this sweet sense of sincerity like I only want to talk and I'm expecting to part ways at the end of the night with the intention of seeing them later to get to know them better (because that's how I roll. Forming strong emotional bonds over time - awww yeah). I'd maybe thrown in a nice pick up line, not a cheesy one - something to start a conversation.

I'd see how long the conversation could go on before I have to introduce myself. Maybe buy her a drink first, (this hypothetical situation takes place in a bar or club, like her song 22. It makes no sense but ssshhh, this is a fantasy so let me have it) basically just treat names as unimportant compared to talking about things, but when I do introduce myself I only say "My name is David" - no last names. The idea being it'll encourage her to reply Taylor instead of her full name. That bit isn't too important because I can always pretend the name drop means nothing to me because I don't listen to the radio *cough* hipster *cough* total lie...

Anyway... so that's phase one. Get to know her by pretending I know nothing about her. I'm basically assuming her ego would find someone who hasn't heard of her fascinating instead of insulting and going for the angle that distancing myself from the hectic spotlight of fame. What a relief to find someone who isn't mobbing her, or living such a busy life that they'd have their own pressures that divide so many celebrity relationships. I'm suddenly the charming sweet everyman... the simple ideal, an innocent soul, this cute little lamb who didn't adore her for her fame but for her smile...

*Quick chortle*

Ok so imagine this worked and I'm dating Taylor Swift now. (SHUT UP IT'S TOTALLY PLAUSIBLE AND MEANT TO BE).

I want a song... and I want to know it is specifically about me. How do I distinguish myself? Well I need a few quirks, something idiosyncratic to really define myself...

So that's why I'll leave her jigsaw pieces here and there... little surprises in the morning when she wakes up to find a fresh cup of coffee and pancakes by her bed...

And a jigsaw piece.

At first this is cute and endearing. Bit weird, but whatever. They don't seem to make anything because none of them connect together and she starts wondering what it is. What wonderful surprise will it inevitably display once I had gone through all the jigsaw pieces? What more mystery and intrigue can this oddly unique everyman hold? Will it just be a big love heart and make her go awwww after she's collected the final piece on some anniversary?

Well let's assume the relationship goes south eventually because I'm actually a terrible manipulative human being (as demonstrated by THIS ENTIRE BLOG POST) and she is starting to get bored of the everyman as I'm just... a normal person with nothing special. She's too busy, she's got a new album to work on, and I'm just in her way... I just keep giving her jigsaw pieces and she doesn't have time for this quirky game anymore so she just leaves them there as I place more and more, not even accompanied by a sweet gesture of breakfast or a nice sweet "You make me happy" card, they're just there.

Jigsaw puzzle pieces everywhere.

The relationship ends.

My last act is giving her the rest of the pieces as I leave. After a bitter and lonely post-break up moping session she decides to start putting together this once incomprehensible puzzle as she looks up in a rhyming dictionary what rhymes with "jigsaw" (maw, claw, buzzsaw, chainsaw, hacksaw, handsaw... "I should've known, I should've foresaw, that you wouldn't be right for me, when you gave me a jigsaw...") and what does she see?

A scary clown.

And that's how I will know her first single "Jigsaw" from her new album will be about me and only me and I will laugh maniacally about it every time it's on the radio.

Dear Every Employer Ever

*kicks down your door* I'm awesome!

Don't bother scrambling to escape through the window this interview is ON so hard right now whether you want it to be or not. So what are your first basic questions? Why do I want to work here? I sure as hell don't care about this place! I don't even know the name of this store! Heck, all I care about is that A4 sheet of paper someone has haphazardly stuck to the window outside that says in bold print "workers wanted". It is the beacon to my kind: the overlooked unemployed arts students.

Sit down. I said no escaping.

Why then am I forcing this interview on you if I don't care about whatever your establishment is? (I literally did not know it existed until I passed it just then and started breaking your office) Because MONEY. I want your money - no you can put your hands down I'm not robbing you, I'm an employee. That's all I care about. Fun experiences, great team ethic, new whatevers and all that jazz is BS. You and I both know that no one is really pumped to apply to places that say "great team environment!" Seriously, how many excited blog posts do you read that go "oh man, Coles! I'M SO EXCITED TO APPLY TO COLES! I HOPE I GET A JOB THERE BECAUSE I'LL BE PART OF A TEAM!"? Well, this one now if you take that out of context. Nah man, no one cares... I'm not saying that I'm against people (I haven't worked long enough in retail to despise the human race but please don't hold my naivety against me) or working with them, I can do that. I am so up on this team stuff. I'm a film major - literally nearly everything I do involves teams.

Money money money. Put your money in my bank account where it belongs. But don't take this attitude to mean I'm cynical and won't really care about the work you give me. No no! I'll do it! I'll do it gladly. You're, after all, paying me. I like that. I like you, even if you are a bit sweaty with fear right now. Shhh... shhhh... the more you struggle the longer it takes. If you are under the impression that anyone else working for you has any other aspirations other than to take your money then you're quite deluded. People don't go to work to have fun, they go to work so they can afford fun when they're not working.

Do I have to strap you in? I brought duct tape. Don't yell out for help or I'll use it. Don't think I'll run out either, I have half a dozen rolls of this stuff. Why you ask? Shut up I'm being interviewed. Damn managers don't know how to conduct an interview these days.

What skills can I bring to the table? What skills do you need? Tell me, what fascinating special training do I really need for this job? What makes your food servicing place or trinket selling store so unique? I nearly have 2 degrees! You run the kind of business that hires teenagers! The skills I bring to you are my own two hands. Now don't knock them before you've hired them... these hands... let me tell you the things these hands can do...

OK that makes you look uncomfortably aroused. That didn't go as planned.... awkward.

You don't need me to have years of experience (which I don't seem to be getting despite my hard efforts of forcefully strapping managers down to their furniture and berating their businesses) you need spare hands and a friendly face. I can do that. Look, I'm smiling! What's wrong? Is there something off putting about my smile? Not enough teeth? I can gain extra teeth, don't you worry... After you I'm applying for a dentist job.

I can do that! I can deal with customers. Swipe the thing, take their money, give them the thing. Repeat. Be nice. Don't eat anyone. Make food. Give food to people. Shelf empty. Put more of thing on shelf. See? Jobs are simple... So why won't you give me one? I'm sick of not getting an interview, not getting a call back, not even a chance to explain that the 2 pages of past experience doing things, higher education, general list of skills and interests (all filtered down to fit instead of flooding you with details) does not define me. It doesn't even begin to reflect my determined outlook on the world, on my job, on any task given to me. You see the word "determined" on a piece of paper, that means nothing... A resume is pointless. It lacks personality no matter how it tries. I know I sound cynical about this all, like jobs are just the equivalent of training monkeys to push or lift things... but it comes from never being given a chance to demonstrate that I can do that job... if only someone out there would put that little bit of faith in me over that cheaper option of a 15 year old with no experience and the maturity of... a 15 year old. Just one interview would be nice... one that doesn't involve crying. Come on, it's not like you're never going to see your family again... stop sniffling.

Oh, sorry... how rude of me. I've been standing up all this time without taking a chair... and look at the time, I must be off. I've stapled my resume to your pants, just so you won't forget about it or throw it in the bin without reading it first (I think it happens a lot, hence why no one ever calls me back).

*smashes the window*

Oh shut up, you'll get this chair back later. I'm only taking it until I get a job... It's not like I can currently afford furniture anyway...

Congratulations to Dan Howell

Youtube has this section where it recommends youtube channels and shows you in small writing that they have about 457K subscribers as if this is incentive. My youtube recommendations have been pretty much stuck consistently on AmazingPhil, Tom Milson, Danisnotonfire, Albinwonderland and for some reason the IBA Bodyboarding World Tour. I refresh and it is the same. Youtube insists that I should subscribe to these people. Just do it. Do it. Hurry up. You don't like entertainment, huh, punk? Think your videos are more entertaining?

Dick.

Well persistence pays off because I decided to finally check out Danisnotonfire... once I noticed that the little numbers under his name had read 999K. Whoa. Nearly at 1 million? That's a massive achievement and not many people have reached this mark. It's so fancy that Youtube literally gives you a gold trophy for getting there. So obviously thanks to peer pressure and the prestige of watching someone reach such an impressive milestone I decided to watch his videos for the rest of the day deciding whether or not he was worth subscribing to.

The thing is I pretty much knew I wanted to subscribe only a few videos in... but he was slowly and steadily climbing to 1 million... So naturally the thought occurred to me "What if I could be the 1 millionth subscriber?" The pace was gradual enough to be predictable. I would constantly refresh to check on the progress in between watching videos. I'd be lying... waiting... with ninja precision that I would attempt to channel from the nearest avid ebay buyer who likes to snipe with 30 seconds left on the bid.

It was taking longer than expected. But then... then... 11pm came (+08:00 from GMT) and he was intensely close. I readied myself, 11:19pm came. I refreshed. 999,998! GO! GO! SUBSCRIBE! I pounced on the button knowing someone would subscribe in the time it took for my mouse to move those pixels across the screen.

REFRESH. WILL I SEE A VICTORY SCREEN?

1,000,027!!!

NOOOOO! So close!

I refreshed again and it had jumped to 1,000,052! In fact in the past 11 hours it has gone up by over 3000. It took him 6 hours to go up nearly 700 before!

It was then I realised the unfortunate truth that the prestige of being the 1 millionth subscriber (an honour that went so someone many months ago due to closed accounts and people unsubscribing) was not a goal solely for me but for many, possibly hundreds... at one point the subscriber count went down momentarily when it was getting close as if people were unsubscribing just so they could re-subscribe at the opportune moment. That's why it was barely going up and then just on the brink- BAM! SHOT UP!

The lucky #1 million is lost in a flurry of emails and intensely close time signatures. It is impossible to tell who the victor is and they themselves don't know either. Oh well.

It is time to remember that being a subscriber is not about a sense of personal achievement. It is to show that you care about the content that someone has spent the time making and wish to engage with this content. Danisnotonfire is a brilliantly funny and talented vlogger and I am glad that I am now a watcher and that's all that matters...

But damn I was so close...

Bad Bands and Fringeworld

I went into Northbridge on a Saturday night (this is often the start of a tragic story, and admittedly it does end with security manhandling two people by grabbing the hair on the back of their heads, but that's besides the point) to film a live band performance. This starts off with me standing outside of the place feeling awkward, having arrived what I thought as late only to discover that the place isn't even open yet... Well the rest of the crew arrives (I was just a cameraman so knew very little) and we get to walk in first instead of waiting in line because we need to set up. I felt vaguely important. Not very, just slightly above the base level of undistinguished customer.

The band plays. We record it. Things go fine. I started off doing a master wide, and we switched cameras and positions through the performance. Then we sat down, a job well done (I hope) to relax and a friend of a friend convinces us to stay for the next band. So we do.

The band starts. Instantly I don't like it. To best describe the playing style I would use words like "demisemiquaver", "banging", and "epilepsy". It is an assault on the ears. It is the most energetic thing I've heard since Dragonforce and I'm busy watching the keyboardist's hands blur with speed as he bangs out chords then does some intense arpeggios. It all blurs into noise with no distinct melody to me. At one point they yelled into a microphone. No lyrics... just outright screeching it seemed. Wow.

Thing is we're sitting right next to the stage so we're right next to the speakers. It's so loud my pants are noticeably vibrating and it is almost impossible to yell at people nearby to have conversation. I decide to type messages on my phone and hand my friend the screen so he can read it. Despite the obvious frantic energy exploding off the stage I am intensely inanimate. My hands placed firmly on my camera bag. With not even a twitch of facial expression my head rotates, Terminator style, to my friend sitting next to me... and slowly shakes back and forth.

I pick up my phone and type "no." He reads and laughs. The noise continues to assault my ears. I type something new. "NO."

Listening to the song seemed to drag on forever. During it I would occasionally make snide remarks about their performance. The notes were played so fast and everything was so loud that I typed a new message: "How do they know if they've played a note wrong?" for all I knew they weren't playing their songs right at all but were just playing them at the right speed. A speed I must admit is quite impressive and their technical skill alone is quite reasonable... but speed does not make a musician.

"I should get my Nana to listen to this..." I remarked at one point.

After a few of these jibes at the band and what I considered to be one of the worst things I'd listened to in a very long time the friend of a friend who convinced us to stay leaned over and told me she was dating one of the band members...

See this is the kind of awkward moment where in sitcoms the main character tries to backtrack and go "well, no I'm only kidding, they're not THAT bad... I like their uh... (insert something here)". I don't care that this may have been a really awkward moment.

"I don't retract my statements..." I said before going back to watching with mild entertainment. See the thing is they were so bad that I found it funny to watch. They were so into this performance that I thought it was comical...

"Though on the bright side, he has very strong fingers..." I remarked. She nodded.

"That is a very good thing."

See turns out she wasn't offended at all by this. She actually agreed with me to an extent that the song they were playing wasn't very good. (Though I doubt she hated it as much as me. I really did despise it and would've walked away after 5 seconds if it weren't for the fact that my friends weren't moving and after a while I thought it was so bad it became funny). It turns out that it was their early work. Then they started playing something new AND SUDDENLY IT WENT FROM AWFUL TO GOOD!

ACTUALLY REALLY ENJOYABLE SORT OF THING I WOULD DELIBERATELY LISTEN TO! They turned into this sort of Post-Rock instrumental sort of thing. It was awesome. I stopped digging into them quietly and started actually sincerely enjoying. I have avoided using names in case anyone involved finds this and gets offended by anything I've said though I don't actually remember the name of the band so couldn't tell you that if I wanted to... But yeah. They had one really bad song that was just really long, and then got better.

Well then we went walking around the city, ate at a Chinese restaurant, then went to Fringeworld. There was much sitting around and talking then watching as a bunch of security guards got into place to surround this drunk that was lying on the ground so he couldn't run. They told him to get up, they started grabbing him and his friend tried to intervene to tell them not to be rough and they held them both by the back of their hair saying something about trespassing... Spectators interfered and security got angry at them but released the two guys and told them to leave. I left after that. After all, it isn't a night out in Northbridge until some drunk gets man handled by security. When I walked out the guy was arguing with the security guard outside of the premises about something from a distance probably telling them off for their treatment of him as he wasn't even resisting... he was just slow to obey. Though he seemed hesitant to leave after they'd released their grip as he was angry and had some point to prove.

So that was a bit unfortunate but I was just a random observer and not sure of the entire context so couldn't comment further.

Add this to my list of nights I've gone out into the horror of Northbridge and come back intact.

I Don't Understand Youtube Copyright

Their guidelines aren't very helpful.

OK so it seems simple right? Don't use copyrighted material in your work. OK. Simple.

So a while ago I monetized my videos - not due to any misguided impression that I could make any money off them but because Youtube kept bugging me to do so because it... likes me? A robot wanted fresh ad space? Well I had a few videos up which I generally had avoided anything that wasn't %100 mine with a few exceptions which weren't so blatant as to set off sirens deep in the offices of Google's offices. COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT! COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT!

In my video Eric Roberts Thinks I'm pretty I have an image of The Master from the Doctor Who movie and a still from The Dark Knight to show the audience who he is. That's apparently fine despite me not being from Fox or Warner Brothers. Fair use?

Another video called A Day in the life of an Aspiring Author had nyan cat playing in it as well as The NaNoWriMo Song by ALL CAPS which I appropriately credited in the description. The cool thing about DFTBA records is some artists allow you to use their stuff in your videos as long as the other elements of that video are your original work and you credit them with a link back to their website. I did that, but I don't think that means I'm allowed to use the work for commercial purposes so despite Youtube saying "yeah make money off this!" I was like "Whoa! No. I have to un-monetize this. Surely that's not allowed."

So Youtube seemed to be pretty lax when it came to enforcing what I perceived Copyright Law to be. This was all uploaded prior to me monetizing my videos so they all were monetized by default (after some amount of review) when I became a partner. All subsequent videos are reviewed upon upload.

Then I uploaded a video with my Furby in it and that was a big no. Can't do that. OK so I'm assuming that's because I don't own the Furby logo and the sounds it makes right? Well my wall is covered in copyrighted images of posters. My shirts have Comic Book characters on them with tiny TM symbols on them. I've used a sonic screwdriver in one of my videos and I didn't own that noise (I think, or was that my other channel?) How particular am I meant to be here about what gets displayed? Because when it comes to making films at Murdoch they won't allow ANY FORM OF LOGO OR TRADEMARK. We cannot show brand names on our clothes, when filming cars we need to frame out things like "TOYOTA" and if we get anything accidentally in there we either have to reshoot or go into After Effects to blur it out frame by frame.

Then I uploaded something with about 2 seconds of robot noises and that was also not allowed to be monetized. What kind of complicated program would they be using to figure out if that robot noise wasn't mine? It wasn't, but from where I had got it I got the impression it was OK to use. Once youtube said no you can't make money off this video I won't really argue with them. It's really not important seeing as I don't make a living off this (or... anything really).

OK so I'd gone from being able to use parts of songs to not being allowed to use short sections of robot noises. Next up was a short video where I used static noise which I believed was under the Creative Commons License attribution 3.0 (I'm starting to actually research copyright things now) which I was under the impression made me free:

• to copy, distribute, display, and perform the work
• to make derivative works
• to make commercial use of the work

Under the condition I credited the original author, which I had.

Now I might be able to go click on a button that proves that this means I can use it... or it might be because I quoted song lyrics in it "Shake it like a polaroid picture" repeatedly. It was just one line though, even if it was repeated. And I got away with part of a song with music earlier? And popular youtuber DailyGrace uses copyrighted music occasionally and doesn't credit it but she can still make money off videos like SEXY 911 PHONE CALLS. (I've seen it with and without pre-roll ads and I'm not sure if this varies from view to view or just means it is no longer monetized?) I see in the comments fights about this about copyright vs fair use and frankly I wouldn't trust a Youtube comment section as a reliable source of information even if the discussion was about how annoying Youtube comments sections are. It has taught me nothing.

The impression I get is that I clearly don't understand copyright. That or Youtube is a bit selective in what it does or doesn't allow based off how popular you are. Though it seems a bit petty to try and blame favouritism on this so I'm going to go with the very obvious and objectively true thing that: I just don't seem to get copyright. It is not as simple as I had previously believed it to be.

I don't really care that I'm not making a whole 21 cents on these videos that aren't allowed to be monetized (besides the Furby one, which would've made probably at least $8 by now probably. Wow, big bucks), but it kinda annoys me whenever I see that tiny ! symbol next to my video that goes "YOU CAN'T DO THIS!" Because there's a thing saying "Copyright strikes" and right now it's green but it kinda weighs on me this idea that all this tiny little stuff ups aren't making me look all that great... like I'm some sneaky little vlogger trying to fool Google into giving me money I don't deserve by trying to sneak little copyright things in. Mwahahaha. No. No I'm not trying to get away with making money off other people's things, I'm just not entirely clear on the differences between what I can or cannot use commercially and the fact that they don't give you a reason when they deny your monetization request doesn't help me figure it out.

Is it because they don't believe that static noise is really Creative Commons? Is Creative Commons different in US than it is in Australia? Or is there an issue with the quoting of lyrics? Is that fair use? Is it allowed under use for the purposes of critiquing or reviewing the original work? Each online institution seems to have a varying harshness to their restrictions... Should I bother to try and get my latest video monetized on principal of understanding copyright better despite it not actually making money? Hmmm.

Hmm. I wish they'd taught us more about this at Uni... I never thought I'd be so interested in properly researching Copyright law.

Wow I'm Unobservant...

As a film student/content creator on Youtube I've done my fair share of editing. I usually edit my own stuff. Editing involves reviewing the same footage over and over and over again continuously, tweaking this, tweaking that, rearranging it, watching it back to see if it flows right, wait what's wrong woops I did that bit wrong I need to tweak it some more. And so something short can take a long time to make properly and by the end you'd think I'd know the footage better than the back of my hand.

Well, sometimes yes. (Also word of advice: if you ever edit a music video... DON'T make it to a song you really enjoy because by the end you would've heard it 300 times on repeat and will loathe it.) But sometimes I miss things.

For a film I made in highschool there was a scene where the character (played by me, because I'm a man of many trades and little friends to do things for me) walks onto the road and gets hit by a car. It was the biggest thing I'd embarked on so far, took ages, required a lot of editing, and so I proudly showed it off to the class to see what they thought. The character gets hit by a car and someone goes "what happened to his jacket?"

...

Wait... what? Turns out there was a massive continuity error where in one shot he's wearing a jacket, and in the next he's not. Which meant I had to reshoot the scene. I somehow hadn't picked up on this despite watching it several dozen times over and over.

*face palm*

This complete lack of observance of what's actually happening in frame in the aim of making sure the footage fits properly still continues. For instance my latest youtube video I briefly mention the idea that "shaking it like a polaroid picture" is as widespread a myth as a duck's quack doesn't echo.

Problem is I said "a duck's echo doesn't quack"

...*double face palm*

A Year of Books

2012 was the year I decided to read at least one book per week on average. Not as some new years resolution sort of thing, but because I bought so many books that I now have books stacked horizontally on books, and books stacked on top of each other on my desk. I have many books and I haven't read half of them. So I'm fixing that one book a week.

I read a few John Swartzwelder books:

• Dead Men Scare Me Stupid
• The Exploding Detective
• Earth vs Everybody

His writing style may seem simplistic and his characters lack depth but gosh darn they are hilarious books. He was the writer of 59 episodes of The Simpsons (more than any other writer) back in the days of classic episodes that everyone quotes and it shows why he's probably written one of your favourite classic Simpsons line. Brilliantly absurd, amazingly funny, they are instantly loveable short pieces of humour.

• Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson
• Crunk Juice by Steve Roggenbuck (a book of poetry, which I reread multiple times. It's funny, it's uplifting, it's strange)
• Watchmen by Alan Moore
• Excelsior! by Stan Lee

I read multiple Terry Pratchett Books:

• The Last Continent
• The Colour of Magic
• The Light Fantastic
• Mort
• The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents
• Witches Abroad

The Hunger Games trilogy (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Mockingjay) by Suzanne Collins. I had heard about it before and saw that it was being made into a movie so decided to read the books first so I could be adequately excited by the news. Little did I expect that they were published by Scholastic and actually written for a far younger audience. You know, books about dystopian societies about children brutally murdering each other and civil war is just the kind of thing you expect in a young teen book.

• Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now by Andrew Jordan
• If You're Happy and you know it... by Andre Jordan

Dark humoured or outright depressing. It jumps between the two and so becomes a heartfelt and beautiful collection of drawings that is endearing despite its simplistic style.

• Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick
• A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

To be honest, I really relied on the Nadsat dictionary I printed off from Wiktionary because the Nadsat is just so thick in the beginning. Though eventually I did rely on it less and less until I didn't even have to consciously think "word A means B in English" it was just reading it casually as if it was just part of my language. It was really cool this idea of conditioning the reader on how they read a book by making them learn part of a "language" in a book about conditioning someone on how to think.

Nearly EVERY JOHN GREEN BOOK EVER (that he is the sole author of).

In order of reading (I think)

• The Fault in Our Stars
• Looking for Alaska
• An Abundance of Katherines
• Paper Towns
• Will Grayson, Will Grayson (co-authored by David Levithan)

The Fault in Our Stars is my favourite book of 2012. I absolutely adore it. I read it in 2 days. It'll make you cry. Go read it now. I have yet to read Let it Snow: Three Holiday Romances, which is co-authored by Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle.

• Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham
• The Children of Hurin by J.R.R. Tolkien
• The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Footrot Flats 9 by Murray Ball
• V for Vendetta by Alan Moore
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
• Umbrella Academy: Dallas by Gerard Way
• Spider-man J: Japanese Knights by Yamanaka Akira
• Spider-man J: Japanese Daze by Yamanaka Akira

Spider-man manga. Brilliant. It's so corny and ridiculous.

• Moab is my Washpot by Stephen Fry

By Tom Taylor I read:

• Star Wars: Invasion: Revelations
• The Deep

He's a pretty cool guy and I wish the Star Wars: Invasion series wasn't currently going nowhere because I really enjoyed reading it.

• Torn by Andrew Constant, (art by Nicole Scott, John James)
• The Antidote by Oliver Burkeman
• Machine of Death by various

By Justin Randall I read both Changing Ways book 1 and 2. The artwork is just astonishing and the story intriguing. I can't wait for book 3, but considering book 2 was released this year and the art isn't really simple it'll be at least a year or two before the next one. 

• Fight Club by Chuck Palahnuik
• Unlikely by Jeffrey Brown
• The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson
• The Scott Pilgrim series (1-6) by Bryan Lee O'Malley

I love Scott Pilgrim. I decided to reread it for the 3rd or 4th time. It's amazing. I love the magic realism, the video game references, the humour, everything. It is amazing. Scott is a cheating, rude, self absorbed and delusional moocher yet he's still loveable to us. And Wallace. Oh Wallace is the best thing ever. He's seriously my favourite character.

• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
• Vampire Breath by R.L. Stine

Oh man the nostalgia. I don't remember reading that particular one as a kid but it's great picking up an old Goosebumps book. They're funnier than I remember and wow so short. Back as a kid that was a reasonable read, now I look at it and go "Wow. It would've even take me a couple of hours..." and the chapters are a few pages long at best! There's moments of suspense every 5 minutes, it's great.

• Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

This book had moments where I wanted to highlight certain sentences or bookmark pages because of cool phrases or sections I enjoyed. Particularly there's one quote "peculiar travel suggestions are dancing lessons from God" that I really like. The Book of Bonokon is filled with interesting tidbits of scattered philosophy that aren't necessarily applicable to real life, but cool nonetheless. There's an odd structure to this book that isn't immediately unusual, but the chapters occasionally will end halfway through conversations. It's like they end on punchlines and the chapter was part of the set up for the "joke". Sometimes it's funny, sometimes I guess that's just a convenient spot to end. Anyway, it's an fascinating book and I do suggest you read it.

• RoosterTeeth comics Year 3 - Griffon Ramsey

I got these at Supanova. It's signed by Burnie Burns and Gavin Free, despite neither of them really working on it, just being inspiration for some of the comics within it. Good enough.

And that's it. That's what I completed last year. Though I did nearly finish The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers by Christopher Vogler and I started reading The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling, both of which are quite large so you can see why I didn't finish them.

This year I think I'll tackle Ulysses by James Joyce. Just because I can. It can't sit on my bookcase forever being ignore in favour of smaller books.

Preaching about Jesus on the Train

Train rides aren’t normally interesting. Today though, halfway towards Perth a man got up, an open bible in his hand, and stood in at the front of a row of seats. He spoke out, calling to us that he had something important to say. That’s when he began preaching about the good word of Jesus Christ and how we should all accept him into our lives. The young teens standing behind him scoffed and quietly mocked him before going back to their conversation. He ignored them as if they weren’t there and continued to speak to us.  He told us about how he is a Noongar and grew up near drugs and alcohol and how Jesus improved his life.

There was a passion to how he spoke. He was not a ranting lunatic; he did not rave or appear incoherent. This was not a hellfire and brimstone sermon like a preacher spreading the fear of God into those before him. All he wanted was to share the good word of the Lord to those who would listen and the thing is people did. There were only a few I saw before him (though I did not turn back) who turned their heads to ignore him. I was really worried that people would get offended and tell him with disdain to stop shoving his beliefs on others (though he did say he did not condemn us for our lives, but wished that we would consider how we dealt with sin) but no one did. A man who stood beside him shook his hand before leaving and he carried on. To be honest he was far more interesting of a preacher than the people at Church. He wasn’t telling people what they came here to listen to, he was there to win over hearts of non-believers and see the way he did, to see that there was glory in things through God.

As far as ways to convert people over, randomly starting to preach to a train cart is a bit unusual but I’m sure you could probably think of a stranger example. I was worried at first that people would jeer at him and try and boo him into sitting down but they didn’t. I didn’t hear any mutters of him being crazy or annoying, if people didn’t care they just didn’t listen.

I admired the man’s faith and commitment even though I didn’t agree that this was the best platform to spread his message. Although I disagreed with him as he moved through the seats I reached out to shake his hand.

As we reached Perth he told us all that if they wanted to accept Jesus they could talk to him and he’d give them a simple prayer to accept him into their lives. My journey continued on towards Murdoch station so I did not get off with him but I saw out the window that he was standing there waiting for passengers to pass him. A few that had been sitting not far from him stopped to talk to him and I was still worried he would be met with harsh words or criticism, but they seemed interested and shook his hand to congratulate him.

If you had asked me before today if anyone could start preaching on a train during the middle of the day and not got told to shut up by those around him I would’ve thought it absurd.

Getting Drunk on New Years Eve

First step is to go to a bottle shop for supplies. I'm not much of a drinker so I had my handy friend (who is younger than me) as a guide to what I might theoretically enjoy. I wish I could remember the name of the place we went to. It was this big place devoted to discount alcohol. You could get $3 wine. It was like the IGA of alcohol.

Next step is pausing to go for a swim because it's summer. The water was warm. None of that refreshingly cool getting in step by step because it's so cold sort of nonsense here. Nah, the water is just a little bit cooler than the air so is technically an improvement. My left ear got blocked up because of this. Spoilers: this is relevant to the story later on. Read on excitedly to find out how! (Then be disappointed when it isn't too amazing).

Then... onwards! To the middle of nowhere where the roads don't have curbs and just kinda fall apart into rough edges that turn into gravel or dirt and there's no street lights to show you the way if you were driving in the dark. Yep, we went into the country to get drunk. There were tents to sleep in! More on that later.

This property was huge. We explored barely a fraction of it. There was considerable space for parking near some rusted old greenhouses (well, I think they were greenhouses. They could've been sheds with the sides fallen off) that overlooked a bunch of trees that went off into the distance. Nearby was a room with flashing lights bound to cause seizures in anyone with epilepsy for the sake of dancing in. A path was paved through a garden, lit with christmassy lights and fibre optic lights, that led to the open area outside the back of the house where a karaoke machine stood playing nostalgic music from a decade ago, and some less nostalgic music from only a few years back too...

Then there was the tent area near the pool (a drink is to be taken every time the host said "no glass in the pool area", though I don't think anyone bothered with this drinking game). The odd thing was the grass squished beneath my feet, like the ground beneath it wasn't compacted at all. It was uncomfortably soft.

"It sinks when I step on it! IT MAKES ME FEEL FAT!" I yell out to whoever I was talking to at the time.

Later on, with alcohol in me, uneven ground that sinks when you step on it, and a problem with my left ear, I noticed that balancing was a gauntlet I had not prepared for! But I did not fall over. I got used to it eventually.

I didn't get as drunk as I expected myself to get. I'd brought a ridiculous amount of alcohol (vodka, red wine, white wine, margaritas, and some premixed cocktail stuff in a box because I'm classy like that) that I did not expect to get through. I think I did surprisingly well when it came to good decision making while drunk. I deliberately made sure I stopped talking to people I wasn't sure would be comfortable around me while drunk (and it's not like drunk me would pick up on that so safe bet is to let them be with closer friends), whenever I was approaching a small group of people I'd inquire if they were having a private conversation first to know if I should come join or walk away, I didn't make out with my friend who was strangely eager to do so, etc...  so good work drunk me for not being obnoxious or doing anything regrettable! Yeah!

We counted down to new years and then there were hugs constantly given to anyone nearby for the next 5 minutes.

Long story short (...er, it's been going on for 9 paragraphs so far) I didn't end up sleeping in the same tent I had originally planned. I had to find an alternative tent to sleep in, which ended up being Alex's. Thankfully wasn't too awkward sharing a tent with him and his girlfriend, though I wish I'd thought about bringing a pillow... I had brought a sleeping bag, but it was too hot to put it on, so I was sleeping on it with a bit of it scrunched up like a pillow but it was subpar. Everyone else was still awake and being noise so despite it being 4am, I was still awake.

It started becoming light and I realised I was still awake. I watched the sun rise on a new year...

Then collapsed and tried to freaking sleep. JUST SLEEP DAMN IT. The flies got into the tent and irritated my feet. Damn it. Sleep. Want sleep. So when it was 7am and I had woken up I wasn't sure if I felt worse because of the alcohol or the lack of sleep...

I feel good about this new year. Sure, it'll have the same problems and troubles as the last one probably, but it'll be better because I've learned a little from last time... Even though I don't believe in New Years Resolutions I know I'll find some way to try and improve myself.

Awkward Perils of Making a Youtube Video

So I make vlogs (I never stop telling people this apparently) and I also still live at home with my family. That is normally fine because I can sit down and talk in my room with the door closed and no one can see or hear me being weird. Problem is I was making a vlog today where there's a cut away joke to me in the kitchen banging a jar of peanut butter against the kitchen counter while yelling at it then sobbing...

And my mother is aware that I HAVE a Youtube channel but she doesn't know much more than that and I don't want to explain it to her... all she knows is that this is my "job" only I don't get paid for it but I in theory am "earning" money...

Anyway, to avoid being carted away for being crazy I decided I needed to tell my family that I was going to start yelling and it was OK, it was just something I needed to do... just... don't ask questions...

Also please be quiet... I need quiet on "set"... while I bang the peanut butter.

Filming was interrupted when my brother walked into the kitchen to make himself a sandwich using the peanut butter. It was OK though as I didn't have a particular schedule to stick to. I had the rest of the day to get a shot of me hitting the kitchen table with peanut butter... This is Youtube after all, not a big Hollywood production (though now it is a life goal of mine to have a scene involving peanut butter in a high budget film just so I can recreate this one shot). He walked away muttering something about me being strange.

"THIS IS MY JOB!" I yell at him.

It was intensely awkward and I waited until my mother had gone into a different room so I could close the door on her to increase the chance that she might not hear me.

I did the shot and Wesley yelled at me to be quiet.

It was even more awkward than the time I was filming John Green's Face and had to keep running up and down the stairs right next to my mother for the sake of having more than one take... then the microphone didn't work and I had to do it all over again.

And soon I'll be filming a vlog where one of the jokes involves me yelling about how I'm on fire (while OUTSIDE). That's going to be interesting to film...

Don't mind me neighbours... I'm just... a guy walking around with a camera... yelling about his socks being on fire when they actually aren't. It'll be done in After Effects I swear.

I'm not crazy, I'm just doing this for youtube.

I want to be someone’s favourite youtuber.

It doesn’t matter if I don’t have a million subscribers, or hundreds, or even tens of thousands. I just want to be so utterly entertained by me that I am their favourite youtuber. Making people laugh is what makes me feel accomplished as a person. Sure, I love it when I check youtube and find someone has commented telling me I’m funny, or cute, or adorable, etc but it is the best feeling when I see someone tell me their going to subscribe then search back through my older videos commenting as they go along. That’s the best kind of subscriber: the kind who sees an online body of work and isn’t content just to look at it every now and then but takes the time to consume it all and appreciate the effort put into every video. My old videos barely get noticed until someone who has seen my recent work decides to go through my uploads.

It makes me feel appreciated that I’m not just a hit and miss entertainer with one funny video that gets all the attention, but a myriad of work that brings back a person to keep watching.

That’s the kind of subscriber I try to be. When I started watching Vlogbrothers I made it a goal of mine to watch every single video of theirs. It took 3 months to work my way back through their near 5 year history of regularly updating but I did it. I did the same with Frezned (who is ridiculously funny). Right now I’m in the process of slowly making my way back through MorganPaigeLoves who is an amazing (and slightly underrated) American vlogger. She is funny, interesting, full of enthusiasm and her joy is infectious. She’s also pretty which isn’t really important to the viewing experience but is a bonus (don’t worry, you’re pretty too Hank, John, and Tom).

All these people have thousands of subscribers (Morgan having a humble 13,228 as of me writing this compared to Frezned's 73,073 and Vlogbrothers whopping 854,974) and I never expect to reach such huge levels of popularity. (Gosh no that'd be ridiculous that that many people would find me interesting let alone FIND my youtube channel to determine whether or not I am interesting) But if I can just get a few fans and keep them consistently entertained then I have done something important with my time.

So here’s to a new year of content creating and making people laugh!

For those wondering my youtube channel is Oneupdateatatime and can be found here.

Geese are Evil

Geese are just outright dicks. They are the dicks of the bird world. Let's face it... they are cruel and heartless beasts. They're also scary.

Seriously, just look at this goose.

It looks like it has spotted prey and is about to charge at me screeching in some kind of horrifying black speech (this is a Tolkien reference not a racial thing guys. Calm down).

Now I'm not trying to say that they're evil... but basically if birds had religion then Geese would be the personification of demons (and I suppose Swans would be Angels)...

Something majorly important about geese that I don't understand is WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE THEY HAVE TEETH!? They're not even predatory birds and yet their bills have been serrated to have little sharp teeth like things. That's freaky and I suspect it is just a thing they do to themselves by filing down their bills so they look tougher, like a bikey getting sweet tats all over his body so people know they have a high tolerance for pain and you should back away if they glare at you. If too many people get accustomed to it they'll find new ways to modify their bodies to be more fearsome... maybe embed spikes into their wings so they can attack people just by flapping at them.

The hissing is just another way to say "f*** you, we're tough and you should fear us!" There's no reason a bird needs to hiss. That's a snake's job. Geese just enjoy instilling fear.

I went to a park by a river recently and there was a gang of 8 of them. They circled me. Literally they walked over and walked around me... and stared at me... they just... watched... waiting... so close you could reach out and touch them if you were so void of any sanity and no longer wanted a hand. Being the man that I was a grabbed onto the girl I was hanging out with and told her I was scared. I also told her that if I died fighting off geese to tell people stories of how I died, and to paint me as a hero.

But eventually after getting their fill of fear (which sustains them. Fun fact: they don't need food if they have a sufficient supply of fear to fuel them, just like Black Lanterns) they went away. WE SURVIVED! WE SURVIVED 8 WHOLE GEESE!

Turns out they use them in replacement of guard dogs in England because they're vicious. THAT'S JUST HOW EVIL THEY ARE! You can replace a Doberman with a goose. That's messed up.

If you're still not convinced that geese are messed up and evil just take a look at this:

Surely this is...

...the face of something...

 ...that wants to kill you...

...and eat ALL your babies.

Lock your doors, stay away from open rivers... and if you see a goose...

... RUN!

(photo credit goes to me. I nearly lost an arm getting you this)

My Sister's Doctor Who Wedding

My sister got married on Saturday! Woo! Congratulations to her and her wonderful husband Lyndon. They're very happy together and I wish them much more happiness in the future.

It all started months ago when I received this invitations inspired by The Impossible Astronaut, the first episode of the 6th season of Doctor Who:

Doctor Who wedding invitations! TARDIS blue envelops and inside there is a time, date, and GPS co-ordinates (blurred here so you can't go back in time and stalk the wedding). That was the beginning of the nerdiness.

The last time I was at a wedding I was... 5 probably, so didn't really remember what was involved. Turns out weddings are way shorter than expected. The face on Lyndon when Isobel walked down the isle was amazing. He looked stunned, amazed, like he could barely contain his happiness. When she stood in front of him it was like the rest of the room wasn't there and it was beautiful to see his big dopey smile. Gosh it was wonderful.

Then... reception time! Now I was the one who drove the bridesmaids to our local church with my car, but then it all shifted around and I was driving the newly weds in Lyndon's car. The thing is, Lyndon's car is an automatic which is... weird. And I'm not really used to them what with having a real license for a real car (real cars have clutches and I don't care if you say I'm body shaming cars). I'd only driven it once and ended up making a vlog about how Automatic Cars are for Lazy People.

Basically I wasn't really sure how to work the thing very well and after a little bit of figuring out what to do next I reversed. Facing the exit of the carpark I rolled down the window and yelled "I'VE NEVER DRIVEN AN AUTOMATIC BEFORE!" to the concerned faces that watched on as I drove off with the married couple.

"I sure hope you know where we're going because I don't..." I inform them (quite truthfully).

Don't worry we survived. In one piece too. Though they did start discussing how they could now have sex in the back of the car... That sentence sounds ambiguous. "Do you mean they were discussing, while sitting in the back of the car, how they could have sex now that they were married? Or do you mean they were discussing having sex in the back of the car while you were driving?"

The answer is yes to both.

THAT'S NOT WHAT I NEED TO HEAR ABOUT GUYS.

The reception was nice. The tables were all named different Doctor Who monsters (I believe I was on Nimon) like Dalek, Rutan, Sontaran, Cybermen etc... and Cardassian (to see who was nerdy enough to catch that it was a Star Trek reference instead of a Doctor Who one, but not everyone would recognise old school references like Rutan and probably assumed it was yet another thing from the 70s).

Then this happened:

These little Daleks were remote controlled and made their way to the dance floor in advance of the newly weds entering the reception. It was awesome.

Dad made a speech about how we have a bookcase of sci-fi at home and how when she heard that my sister had found someone who was into sci-fi they knew he'd fit in just fine with our family and he does. He's awesome. I approve whole heartedly of Lyndon, who has so many books that he has shelves attached to his walls where he can't put bookcases and still that isn't enough. Now I can say "come at me bro" at him and try and challenge him, despite the fact that he's taller than I am.

There, of course, was Gangnam Style played at the wedding because the playlist was not entirely programmed by the Bride and Groom but the DJ as well (so there were a few things that Isobel said "I would definitely not have picked this..." to). More appropriately in character was a Nirvana's Smells like Teen Spirit mash up with Rick Astley's Never Going to Give You Up.

Yes. They rickrolled their own wedding.

Then as the reception came to a close the guests made a tunnel by making archways with their arms by finding a partner. The married couple walked through it as the Red Dwarf theme played and it was awesome.

Remember When I was Funny?

This blog used to be considered humorous. It also used to be my main form of online expression but then I moved onto Tumblr and the majority of my time was taken up by that. It was simpler, I devoted more time to quick short text posts that were lost quickly down dashboards and became like diary updates because the format seemed to encourage that. Anything funny I decided to write there whereas this space was redefined for less of a diary blog and more of an opinion blog where I reserved updates for increasingly political and opinionated entries. Now if I have something I believe to be a funny monologue I upload it to my youtube channel. So what really is this blog left around for?

I've been thinking a lot about what I write online and how often. On one hand I sporadically ignore this blog whereas I heavily favour Tumblr to the detriment of the rest of my life. I've been thinking about how I choose to represent myself online and the person I want to be, though that last sentence implies I really should be thinking about addiction...

I'm not one for new years resolutions. They're a stupid idea. If you have something you need to improve upon you shouldn't wait until a new year starts to do it. Maybe that's why they fail... because people don't care enough to start them when they come up with them.

Well if I had one it should be this: find a use for this blog again. No regular updating because schedules stifle creativity. I inherently post longer posts than on Tumblr so it'll be interesting to get back into a longer form of written expression. Maybe I'll be funny again instead of posting political rants that have been done to death everywhere else online.

And I'd like to get off Tumblr more often. That may seem like I'm trading one drain of my time for another but Tumblr is fleeting and a post disappears into the ether in under a day whereas posts here still get traffic years onwards and so I should think more about what I put into it, why it should be interesting, and how it represents me.

So I'm going to write things that show off my sense of humour more. Hopefully. We'll see. Or I'll just make a temporary attempt to use this blog more often and write lengthy journal entry styled things. We'll see.

Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year.

The Singing Boy on the Train

While travelling on the train recently I was sitting only a few seats away from someone who was obviously quite mentally handicapped. They were being taken into the city by what looked like their mother, maybe to go shopping or eat, I don’t know. They had their phone out and were playing music through the speakers instead of earphones and normally that’d be an annoying thing to do but they were singing along with it. They weren’t being some obnoxious rebellious teenager who liked to crank their music to the ear damaging points on their earphones so the whole carriage could hear, they weren’t being deliberately disruptive, they just played music that was audible and sung along. They were just having fun.

Instead of getting annoyed at this guy for singing along shamelessly and off key to music I personally think is terrible, like Justin Bieber, I found it heart warming. He was so uninhibited and openly engaging in something that made him happy without worrying about how an entire carriage worth of train passengers were obviously judging him. I wasn’t laughing at him but with him.

As I looked around I could see the divide in the opinions of the train passengers. There were those who glared and tried their best to ignore him and thought of him as nothing but an annoyance, or a distraction that should go away. Then there were those who mirrored his happiness and took joy from seeing someone so unashamedly gleeful. People bobbed their heads in time with the singing.

It’s interesting to see how when presented with a situation outside of the norm where someone who isn’t “normal” doing something “weird” people react. It says a lot about their attitudes towards life. I personally think the guy was cool. He was not shackled down by what other people think of feel about him and that is a brilliant example of how to live life. Sure, I never want to be some random singing on a train to Justin Bieber, but I admire his carefree attitude.

But maybe we should sing on trains. Not necessarily literally, though a group karaoke session on the 5pm train ride home would make the whole experience a lot more fun and help us feel a sense of community and togetherness instead of being rigid individuals placed near, but distinctly apart, from our fellow humans. If something out there makes you happy and isn’t there to hurt other people but you worry that complete strangers might judge you then  maybe that’s cause enough to do it. Because maybe people will enjoy it in a good way.

That’s how I want to live.