Subject To Change

So, it’s been a while.

It’s been a hectic month, but a good one in many ways. I hit my monthly target, I helped my team hit theirs and I made a lot of money for both occurences. That is good.

The more money I have, the more I can spend on pointless stuff that makes me feel better.

Anyway, now for a review of my Alessandro MS1s.

They rock. After the burn-in period the harsh, sibilant highs went away, leaving a full, rounded sound.

The bass is full and deep, but has a great level of definition. It’s not mushy or squishy. The trebles are elevated and in your face, which can cause issues for a while, but once you’re used to the headphones it gives a level of clarity like nothing else.

These headphones are great, they need no amplification, but benefit from it like all. They’re rounded and full, a great buy

Before I begin, this isn’t a post about how immoral the RIAA and the ilk are, so don’t bother reading this if you think I’m pulling out a soapbox here.

It’s about my music and my money. Mainly about the amount I spend trying to hear the former better by throwing the latter at it.

I bought some new headphones. For anyone who knows their stuff, they’re Alessandro MS-1s. Imported from the US, no less. And they sound flippin’ lovely

But then I started thinking about how much I spend on music…there’s the mp3 players (ipod Classic 80GB, Creative 60GB, Creative 30GB, Creative 4GB flash, no-name 2GB flash); the headphone amps (no-name British made one and iBasso P2), the DAC (iBasso D1), the headphones (the aformentioned Alessandros, the Crossroads MylarOnes from Korea via Singapore, the Sonys)…

Now, I can justify all these purchases. To me they all seem worthwhile. But to a colleague, who likes music but isn’t into it like I am, these purchases were more than he could take. How could I justify spending that much on headphones?, he asked. To me, spending £75 on importing some great headphones from the US was more than reasonable. To him it was an extravagance that was beyond comprehension.

Dunno what exactly I’m getting at here, but am I spending too much on this stuff? Or is it worth it to hear great music sounding better than I thought possible whilst listening on my poor old speakers?

Whatever, I’m going to stick on some great tunes and be happy that they sound good

It’s like a little baby AT-AT!

I’ve definitely found something to ask Santa for come Christmas…

So, I find myself playing a couple of games these days. Guild Wars is one I’ve played for a long time, Team Fortress 2 is my new found timewaster.

In GW I started life as a warrior. I’d run around, hit stuff, mutilate my way across continents, the usual testosterone fuelled, Club 18-30 holiday scenario. But I got bored of the violence. So I played the more esoteric professions. I started an elementalist (wizard type), but quickly tired of nuking stuff. On to the ritualist, but that was even worse than the elementalist. The mesmer captivated me for a while, but nobody wanted me around as a mesmer, so that foray didn’t last too long.

Throughout this time I’d tried to play monk on a few occasions. I failed…miserably. But I gave it one more shot. The monk in question was called “Flossie The Sheep”. I never expected her to last, let alone become my main character. Had I thought she would I may not have named her quite so frivolously, but these things happen in life, hence the existence of Dweezil, Moon Unit and Diva Muffin Zappa. And at least my silly name is just a character in a game, not a real child. But names aside, I persevered. I found myself enjoying healing people. And people wanted me around. Not many people like being a monk it seems, yet everyone wants one to heal them. As time went by I started getting compliments on my monking. I started to take pride in it, read articles on how to get better at it. And I’m not bad at it

So along comes TF2. A game that seems very dissimilar to GW on the face of things. You run around, you shoot people, they try to shoot you. But TF2 has classes. I wanted to be a Spy. They’re cool, Spies get all the girls etc. But I kept ending up on teams without a Medic. Heavies need Medics, they have a wonderful synergy. So I ended up filling the spot on servers I joined, just because someone had to. And again I found myself getting good at it. People would remember me between games. If I didn’t play Medic and we were losing people would suggest I switched. Once again I fell into being the healer.

The funny thing is that in “RL” I’m not a team player. But in the strange world of teh interweb, I seem to have had it thrust upon me. I have discovered a side to my personality that I was unaware of.

There is no moral to this story. I haven’t taken what I found out online and applied it to my life and become a better person because of it. I don’t want to be a doctor. Helping people? Don’t wanna, just want them to leave me alone. If you thought there might be a heart-warming ending to this post, then you should try a fairy-tale or one of those “human interest” stories at the end of the news (which I don’t find interesting, obviously condemning me to the ranks of the inhuman).

Just as a post-script, when games force me to be a healer I generally take great pleasure in destroying those I am meant to shepherd. My “Theme Hospitals” were hideous places that made the Black Hole of Calcutta look like Butlins. I took great pleasure in the Sims (for about 10 minutes anyway before un-installing the annoying heap of crap) in building nice houses for my Sims, lulling them into a false sense of security then walling them up, Cask of Amontillado style, to die slow deaths. Doubtless this shows some serial-killer-esque tendencies, so at least when you see me on the news you can tell your family and friends that you’re not at all surprised that I was the one found to have killed 17 people and hung their dismembered bodies from lampposts.

The cats are gone.

That’s right, no more. Feel free to reference the Monty Python “Parrot” sketch here if it makes you feel better/laugh/care.

I don’t like cats. Having them in my blog was an attempt to pander to you. Unfortunately for you, whoever you may be, I’ve realised I don’t need/like/care about you. So the cats are gone. This blog is more about catharsis and my need to have a blog more than it is my need for anyone to read said blog. So I’ve killed the cats.

Go on, report me to whichever animal loving authority reigns in your neighbourhood. I care not. The cats are gone, I ain’t pandering to any emo tendencies any more either. Wanna kill yourself? Do it. Just don’t bother me with it. Think life sucks? You’re right. Now get on with it or refer to previous point. Want humourous cat pictures? **** off and read icanhazcheezburger or some other lolcats site. I managed to find the goddamn site, I’m sure you can. If all you came here for was the cats, I’m glad to see the back of you. Hopefully floating in some harbour somewhere.

Good week at work, hit targets, made bonus. Happy sheep etc. I also have a bottle of wine and a huge steak, so life couldn’t be much better. I could have a love life, of course, but that generally leads to more complications, so maybe I’m fine with my steak and wine.

This post was brought to you by a random stream of consciousness and no ****ing cats at all. Whatsoever.

The sheep is sick.

That’s right, I appear to have contracted the influenza virus, one of the greatest killers in the history of man (not quite up there with other men and stupidity, but still a rather virulent wee bugger…)

So, all I want to do right now is languish in my haven (bed) and relax (watch the new episodes of House and Boston Legal), but due to my “training” status at work I don’t have this luxury available to me.

So I have to drag my sorry carcass from the safe haven of my friendly goose-feather duvet to the cold, artificially lit place of work that demands my attendance…

Such is the life of a sick sheep…

And as I suffer here today, so must you all…NO CATS!

In fact I’m thinking of phasing out the cats totally, I have a horrible feeling that’s the only reason anyone visits these days. And whilst the joy of hits is mildly addictive, the thought that people come here only for the feline fun I offer is a blow to the ego. Should the ego suffer like that, the id may rear it’s ugly head, and none of us want that now, do we?

So, I got the new job!

This explains my recent lapse in blogging activity, I’ve had to concentrate on more capitalist endeavours as the training programme at my new place of employ is intensive to say the least.

That’s not a bad thing though, as I love learning new things, so I must say I’m really enjoying the new job. This is a new thing for me, as my previous two jobs have been mundane, degrading and contained a fair amount of violence to myself. This one is mentally taxing (a good thing for my easily bored mind), vibrant, full of interesting and fun people and, most importantly, pays well

As an attempt to make up for my lack of activity recently, I provide for your kitty-loving pleasure not one, but TWO, cats! You heard me right, two cats! And just to avoid offending any delicate sensibilities there were no other fluffy/feathered animals harmed in the making of these ones…

I spoil you guys, I really do…

The post below. Unless you’re an absolute geek like me, of course.

I really need to read my own posts a bit, I mean where did I say that obscure mathematical functions are interesting? Cats and angst, cats and angst…

So anyway, I discovered a new TV show just the other day on an obscure TV channel (in the UK at least). It’s called Dexter and it’s about a forensic blood-spatter analyst who also happens to be a serial killer.

From the couple of episodes I’ve seen so far the characters are interesting, the plots are well written and have a really dark humour that somehow appeals to me (who’d have thought?) and it shows promise (at least until House gets back from his holiday, then we shall have to re-evaluate).

No cats in this post, sorry.

Think of the biggest number you can. Yup that’s right, a really, really big number (no, infinity doesn’t count…)

Then try to get your head around an Ackermann function. These things are big. Really big.

A relatively simple and early Ackermann function gives the following result:

A(4, 2) = This incredibly large string of digits!

Wow!

And I thought Double exponentials were big. Even 9^9^9 contains more numbers than there are particles in the entire universe (don’t believe me? Work out the number then count the particles, get back to me when you’re done). But that doesn’t even come close to the mind-boggling insanity that is the Ackermann function of A(9,9). Sometimes maths can just blow my head away…

To make this post slightly more reader friendly and less number filled, I’m including a cat.

Having spent much time researching and collating results from said research, I have found the winning formula!

It’s…lotsa teenage angst and humorous pictures of cats.

Unfortunately I’m not a teenager and I don’t like cats.

This obviously dooms my blog to be read only by people with an interest in deviant psychological behaviour and friends who want to chronicle my descent into more interesting depths of the aforementioned deviant psychological behaviour.

So, in a move entirely motivated by an attempt to grab greater viewer figures for The Blog (yes, I’ve capitalised it, it makes it more likely to be updated with the increase in significance) I give you the cat picture of the day:

That’s right, not just one cat, but a multitude thereof! Am I not shameless in my attempts to popularise myself?

A small postscript to this post:

The next time Firefox’s built in spell-checker tells me that using a “z” instead of an “s” in the ending “ise” is correct will be the time I finally realise (yup, notice the “ise” on the end of that bad-boy!) my potential as a serial killer of American software developers.