Diary of an up and coming sociopath

Today is my mum’s last day at work. The free CD ride has finally ended. Next time Radiohead bring out an album, I’m going to have to PAY for it. I’m probably even going to have to pay for some of the ones that are already out, since we only every had one copy of each of them between us all.

Never again will I get EMI industry news. Never again will I be reliably told by EMI employees which music chains are owned by the Mafia. Never again will I find out which acts are going to be huge months before anyone else has ever even heard of them. I remember the first time I heard of the Gorillaz, it was a 4-track promo of their new EP. 8 months later the album hit and suddenly everyone was raving about them.

On the other hand, without free CDs and promos, it might mean we finally get some space in this god damn house. You can’t move in the garage, loft or most bedrooms for boxes of CDs. We must have more hours of music in this house than I have hours remaining to listen to them. It got ludicrous at times, I distinctly recall having 6 spare copies of Parachutes in the house at one point, in addition to a copy each.

Speaking of ends, today I notice is the last day of the month. It’s been a pretty productive month, blog-wise. If only the same could be said about other aspects of life, really. If nothing else, I’ve got a pretty good record of the first month of my last summer holiday. I had planned to go and buy comics today, but I think I’m going to hold off until I can afford it, I already stretched my disposable budget by purchasing that graphic novel the other week (even though it was worth it and I’d do it again in a second. I have no regrets.)

I really think I should spend some time on the main site. This blog sucked up all of my creative energy, really, and it seems unfair to draw people here and then not give them anything.

Speaking of which, having finally cut down on the Invader Zim searching people, giving them the Jhonen Vasquez desktops and comic that they wanted, I’m still getting a shitload of people searching for a Sociopath Test, so at some point in the near future, coming from me, using my own PH written quiz thingy which I made a while back but never did anything with - the Sociopath Test! Yes, now all these people who seem to want the internet to tell them if they are a sociopath will find out, courtesy of a self-proclaimed one.

How about that. Today I left the house for longer that it takes to walk between here and the car. This is clearly a step up, since I’m extremely dubious about having left my room most of the past week, let alone house. It’s not that I’ve got anything against the outside world (nothing new, at least) it’s just that the very act of getting in the car to do anything involves spending money.

Anyway. I took Nikki her stuff and harrassed her at work a bit (”Where are the short tent posts? What’s the shortest they get? Do you have this T-Shirt in a different flavour?” and other sundry) and then went to the bank and post office, as one does. All in all, it was pretty uneventful a trip to town. I briefly considered going to Stratford, but I think I’ll save that for tomorrow. I did notice, however, that there were a lot of Big Issue sellers. Like, I walked up and down the Parade once, and down Warwick street, and I got accosted by 7 or 8. I find these people offensive. If I wanted a Big Issue, I’d damn well ask for it, it’s not like I’d have to walk more than 6 paces. Having said that, I’m reminded of something Si/Rowena told me. When they interviewed a homeless person who sold the Big Issue about it, he said something along the lines of “The way I see it, you can either buy a copy of the Big Issue, or get your wallet stolen”. Very friendly.

At least they’re not after charity…

Hey, coincidentally this week turns out to be a very special “Brian Wood Week” over at Newsarama! Guess I started a day early, but even so, a very nice duality. Check out the man himself interviewing Becky Cloonan, artist of Jennie One (And his upcoming 12-issue series, Demo, which I will no doubt be purchasing) and his own introduction to the week where he tells you a little bit about himself. I trust anyone who really cares is adequately equipped to find their way back to newsarama tomorrow, when I understand more articles by and about him will appear.

Yesterday Nikki and I went to Nan’s for lunch, which was nice. Didn’t do a lot else, but then it’s just about spending time together for a while now she’s off in Coventry half the time ;-) She bought me some Transformers stickers the other day, and I actually remembered to open the packet (it was in the side pocket of my car because of being covered in ribena, but that’s he story, not mine) I got two shiny ones! now I just need a friend to start collecting them so I can swap my doubles :-) I also lent Nikki my copy of “Willie the Squowse”. It’s a book about a half-squirrel, half-mouse who does tricks and gives money to a poor family. I’m pretty sure it’s out of print these days, so depending on how bored I get, I might just start converting it into digital form, because I think it deserves to live on. That’s a project for me, I suppose.

Yesterday we all had a big game of iSketch. Normally, Dave, Josh and I would play Worms 2 online when we were bored, but we tried the other day and it turns out that DirectX 9.0 breaks the network support for it, so we were unable to. Wordox is alright, but it’s not the same. iSketch, however… It’s online pictionary. It can be fit-inducingly hilarious, even if some of the words are utterly impossible to drawn. Velvet Painting was pretty hard, but Almond Extract?! The american spellings don’t help sometimes but all in all it’s a good way to waste time.

In my free time, that is to say, in the time I’m not asleep, I’ve been watching Buffy S4. It’s been a good while since i last watched it, and given that I watched Buffy S2 at winter, Buffy S3 in the spring term, Buffy S5 in the easter holidays, and Buffy S6 last term, it seems like a smart choice. I think I might watch Angel after this. Incidentally, I say I’m not doing it while I’m asleep, but yesterday I remember starting to watch the Hush commentary, then waking up to the DVD menu. Slightly disoriented, I recall stumbling in a bit of a daze to the bathroom, brushing my teeth and collapsing back into bed, only just managing not to fall over on the way, so things aren’t entirely done while I’m in my “alert” phase.

My impressions of S4 are as follows: Willow is, if possible, even cuter than in S3. I think this may be the peak version of Willow. Oz was a cool character and also at the top of his game before he left. “Wild at Heart” is a great episode. “Hush” really is as good as I remember. Riley is actually, a really good character who you appreciate a lot more the second time around. I’m only about a third into the series, so expect a few more reflections on the way.

While I’m thinking about it, it ocurred to me a while ago that I used to judge whether or not an entry was adequately sized by how far down the menu on the right it went. Of course, as I add to it, this menu gets bigger and bigger, so suddenly entries that weren’t very long look miniscule, and my longer entries look barely adequate. Maybe I’ll just write more all the time.

Well, anyway, that’s all I had to say for now. I quite enjoyed doing that Channel Zero review so I might start doing a bit more of that kind of thing. If only for the Amazon referrals, ‘natch.

Channel Zero is the kind of comic I’d give to people who don’t like comics. It’s not a gratuitous spandex book, where the characters consist of women with outsized breasts and men with torsos too large for their spines. It’s not drawn in a cartoony style by someone who’s grown up idolising Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko. Most importantly, it’s not for kids.

What Channel Zero is, is a distinctly adult book by someone who is obviously an artist, rather than a professional. There’s a political message that is being actively put across by Channel Zero, both visually and textually, that can be appreciated by anyone open-minded enough to read it.

The book is done entirely in black and white, with a lot of negative space, and almost totally avoiding the use of traditional panels. Visually, it’s about as far from an issue of Spider-Man as you can get in the medium. Wood mixes photomanipulation into his art so that at times, it gets hard to see where the reality ends and the comic begins. Through most of the book, two, sometimes three narratives run simultaneously through different means, and though they all tie together in some way, you can almost go through the book reading just one part. That said, it’s not an easy book to read, even (if not especially, given the departure from the norm) for someone accustomed to the usual visual cues of comics, but it is certainly rewarding - the political current of Channel Zero pulls you along making the specifics of the story almost unnecessary. Channel Zero isn’t about Jennie 2.5 and her attempt to run a pirate TV station, it’s about media manipulation and freedom of expression, about the supression of rights and the necessity of exercising them.

Ironically, Channel Zero is a story that quite possibly wouldn’t even be allowed today, were it published in another medium. Since it was written, certain national governments have empowered its authorities to arrest and detain anyone who displays the kind of views Channel Zero expresses - Jennie 2.5 is, make no mistake, a terrorist who attacks the US government - the Timothy McVeigh of television. Jennie One, the Channel Zero prequel, goes back in time to the formation and passing of the “Clean Act”, conceived initially for Channel Zero as an ultra-paranoid bill to keep terrorism under control and stop the spread of anti-government propaganda, which is taken to extremes and used to arrest anyone for any reason, it’s now far too close to becoming a reality.

Jennie One explores the recent political climate metaphorically within the Channel Zero universe. It shows how Jennie, an artist, goes from being a top class student to a criminal, simply because the Clean Act changes the standards by which she is judged, rather than because of how she changes when it is introduced. Where Channel Zero is clearly set in a future close to, but not our own, Jennie One actively shows how close the link is. State-sponsored street-level executions aside, Jennie One requires nothing to be interpreted unbelievably far - the registering of immigrants and the censorship of certain works serves as a credible link between the current political situation and the previously hyperbolic extension of that, as seen in Channel Zero.

Perhaps working best as a companion piece to Channel Zero, Jennie One is, if nothing else, too short by half. Visually it’s not as forward as Channel Zero, but it works well as an introduction to that style of art, the look of the story evolves towards Channel Zero over the course of things.

On its own, Jennie One is a story about not giving in, about finding your place in society, and about activism. On its own, Channel Zero is about information and the necessity of expression. Taken together, they are a guidebook about how the current political situation could lead to an almost dystopic era of freedom. When Channel Zero wrote about the christian right taking control of America, it was far to early to know how prophetic it was being. When Jennie One writes about riots in New York and the prevention of terrorism being used as an excuse to take any remotely political view opposing established society and use it as an excuse to lock you up, even kill you, one can only hope that it’s not as astute as its predecessor.

The Channel Zero universe is an inspiring piece of work. Anyone interested in media manipulation and the political trends of the post-millennial climate would do well to read from it. Will you like it? If you’re a fan of Fight Club, if worry we’re heading into an Orwellian future, if you think that your country is being run by madmen, then you will identify with what Channel Zero is saying. Of course you will like it. The real question is can you be like it?

Buy them here:

Stayed over at Nikki’s the other night, we spent a couple of hours boxing and unboxing stuff in various permutations. Yesterday morning we sorted through her CDs and I snaffeld myself some free 3CR promos and the New Art Riot EP, which was otherwise destined to fall prey to her Manics purge. I refused to let her get rid of her Smells like Teen Spirit single though. She’ll thank me for it one day. Spurred on by that, I did the same thing this morning, so there’s no doubt going to be a list of crap^H^H^H^Hunwanted CDs of mine up on either livejournal or eBay pretty soon.

Before I went yesterday, Nikki, Jo and I went into Cov. Naturally, it was a shithole, but like a beason of hope in the filth and grime and greyness, the Coventry Forbidden Planet has finally gotten the overhaul the rest of the franchise stores got. I swear to god, it was actually glowing with bright lights, and packed to the roof with stock. Until today I thought the Cov store was destined for closure, so sparse and unclean was it.

And in this reborn store, I found two graphic novels I’ve been searching for for utter months. Jennie One, and Public Domain, the Channel Zero prequel and Design Book, respectively. But being in this poor state, I only had the fucking cash for one of them! I opted to get Jennie One, and now I’m working on getting the other before some other fucker dares to buy it. Nikki managed to pick up Lenore #10, which I look forward to reading too once she’s done with it, and speaking of which, we did the usual thing of me buying FHM so she can read it. I left it with her anyway, because she’s stuck out in Coventry alone now, without even an internet connection at this point.

Anyway, I’m now going to do a piece about Channel Zero, which you’ll have probably read before this one. The wonder of reverse temporality.

1. If your life were a movie, what would the title be?
If not “James Hunt: The Movie”, then it’d be “An Up and Coming Sociopath” (US Title: “Gunz, Bitchez & D@ Hood”)

2. What songs would be on the soundtrack?
I’m going to steal Relly’s idea and do a mix for this, it is just too perfect a question.

3. Would it be a live-action film or animated? Why?
Live action with CGI and animated segments. Why? Because I feel you’d need to use all 3 artforms to explore different aspects of perception. It’d be primarily Live-Action, with the animated/CGI bits being reserved for things like dream & fantasy sequences, action sequences, and things like that. I’d have those instead of stunts, in fact, whenever something was too hard to be done by a normal person, it would slip into CGI/cel shaded.

4. Casting: who would play you, members of your family, friends, etc?
Dave/Xama: CGI only (because I only see them on the ‘net)
James: Jason Lee, Because he makes sarcasm seem like a natural state,
or Matt Damon, because in the movies, that’s probably what I’d look like.
Josh: Kevin Smith/Silent Bob - Long hair, sage advice, and he’d appreciate the trench coat.
Nikki: Thora Birch - Cute and deadly.
Paul A: David Duchovney - Seems mysterious and enigmatic, like he’s always got something funny he’s keeping to himself
Paul R: Keanu Reeves - Reeves straddles the geek/cool line Paul often does.
Relly: Kate Hudson - Because the first few times I met her, I was always reminded of Kate Hudson’s character in Almost Famous.
Rob: Ed Norton - Violent, but restrained and articulate.
Sam: James Marsters - His portrayal of Spike shows that he can mix a bad attitude with genuine loyalty.
Si: Nicholas Brendon - He does the full range of emotion and comedy in a down-to-earth style.
and Optimus Prime as Himself.

5. Describe the movie preview/trailer.
* Black Screen: Dialogue - “I like it best when I’m asleep.” “Why, what do you see when you’re asleep?”
* Fade to me sitting in a chair, the camera zooms in to my pupil as I smile
* CGI/animated flyby of hell, thousands of people in torment and suffering, ending going into a dark tunnel, and back to live-action coming out of the other pupil
* me: “Justice.”
* V/O: “This summer, go beyond yourself into the mind of an Up and Coming Sociopath”
* Beneath voiceover, At the Drive-In’s “One Armed Scissor” playing, with a montage of shots from various points in my life designed to make things seem as interesting as possible, ending with Tyler Durden style insane laughter, and a repeat of the original shot of me in the chair, with CGI blood dripping off things..
* Fade to black with dialogue: “Want to hear what I think about when I’m awake?”

Obviously the trailer would be designed to make things look as action-packed as possible, when in fact the majority of the film would be set up as establishing shots and introspective camera angles at a ratio of 10:3 with Action Scenes.

Well, I can’t say that told you as much as some Friday Fives, but I certainly had fun doing it. Now to get some mixes sorted.

Today I went to Oxford and helped Ian move his stuff in. I got there at about 12, so I spent a while poking about the otherwise empty house, which was naturally intensely interesting. Ian got there about 1. The practise of getting the key was surprisingly easy to do, given the rigmarole it apparantly entailed in theory.

After that, Ian’s Mum took us to the local beefeater for some food. I had Cod and chips, because it was the plainest thing on there. I’m continually bemused by the way restuarants attempt to make your “dining experience” “vibrant and exciting” by smothering the food in all manner of crazed sauces. I’m not quite sure where simple chicken and chips got subverted by “succulent flame-grilled chicken cooked in herbs, garlic, and spices, and smothered with red wine sauce, and chips” (for example..) but I’m pretty certain it annoys me, and I’m realtively certain it shouldn’t add about £4 onto the price. We were also asked, when water was requested, if we would like Fizzy or Still. This, I recently heard, is a fucking scam. If you order fizzy, they can carbonate tap-water with a Sodastream-like machine, and charge you £3 a glass. If you get still, then they’re obligated to give you it free.

After that, I gave Ian the tour of the remaining house, trying to remember each small detail that requires mentioning, which has become second nature to me over the past year.

Got back at about 5, narrowly missing the Oxford rush hour traffic on the way out. Spent a few hours doing the usual, picked up Nikki and had her round for a bit, dropped her off and then came back here. Yesterday I finished watching buffy S6, so I decided to get a new obsession. But I ended up watching an old S2 episode that I skipped last time I rewatched it. (”Ted” with Jon Ritter, who I realised while watching it, is the Dad out of Problem Child)

And then I wrote a blog update.

Take the 100 Acre Personality Quiz!

Apparantly that’s 9 out of 100 points, whatever that means. I can’t say I’m surprised by the results, I always thought Eeyore was the coolest. I think it’s good to have a depressed and passimistic role model within children’s fiction, to prepare them for later in life, when things eventually collapse in on themselves. I can’t help but feel that Marvin from Hitch-Hiker’s Guide is from the same mould as Eeyore.

Oh, apparantly “869,652 people have taken this quiz so far. 11,548 are the same charactor as you.”

I think that says more about the kind of people who do online Winnie the Pooh tests than it does about me, though.

The last couple of days, when at work, Nikki had had contorl of the CCTV radio link-up. What this means, in short, is that somewhere on the other end of that radio is a guy sitting in a roomful of monitors, tracking known shoplifters around the town and telling people working in shops their every move. Across the whole town. Sounding slightly sinister yet? Apparantly, the whole of Leamington is just filled with CCTV cameras that are watching our evey move. I don’t mean to sound alarmist, I’m in favour of a facist police state as much as the next right-wing lunatic, but do people not realise the consequences of this? The implications?

We’re being filmed people, filmed all the time. 24/7. Does this not make you think of something? Something Orwellian? I’m talking, of course, about Big Brother. It’s real and it’s on the streets of Leamington, Stratford, Coventry (Though I’m slightly more inclined to believe that in Cov, they just radio details about the GENUINE shoppers, rather than the thieves…) and God knows where else! It can mean only one thing.

We’re all being watch on the ultimate reality TV concotion - “Big Britain” The rest of the world is laughing at our daily escapades! Voting immigrants IN to the country to hilarious consequences. David Beckham leaving the country? You can’t tell me that wasn’t the result of a phone vote. It makes perfect sense. We’re an island, we’re contained, and the rest of the world hates us. Think about it more. Most recent task? Separate the Iranian Siamese Twins. Our failure to accomplish this task results in the death of Dr. David Kelly. I can’t believe we didn’t see it before.

Ahem.

In other news, today Nikki and I met up with Si, Rowena, Paul, Josh, and sporadically, Sam, in the Jug & Jester for a few hours. All had a nice catch-up and made vague plans to go and see Terminator 3 this weekend. Helped Nikki pack up her stuff and put her to bed, then came back here. Tomorrow I’m going to Oxford to help Ian sort out moving in to the house, so that’ll kill a few hours.

Hmm. That’s about all I’ve got to say that’s remarkable right now, things really slow down. I suppose I should mention my results - B and B+, more than adequate, I feel. I think I’ll try and concentrate on programming modules next term, on account of me doing better in those normally. I’m not so certain I can manage a First, but I think I’m going to sqaurely avoid ending up in Third territory. Whether I get a 2:1 or 2:2 pretty much depends solely on how good a year I have. That said, it’s still going to take some seriously above average grades to drag me up high enough.

Anyway, with that in mind I’m now going to probe next year’s programme a little. This entry is therefore complete.