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Here’s another couple of things that have been annoying the bollocks off of me for some time. These aren’t words that have been invented by morons, they’re words morons are incapable of telling apart. Just because they sound similar doesn’t mean they mean the same thing!

Bought / Brought

These are not synonyms. “I brought a new car” does not mean “I purchased a new car”, it means “I came here with a new car”.

“I bought a cabbage.”

That’s great. How much did it cost when you bought it?

“I brought a cabbage.”

Thanks, but we’re not making coleslaw. You can take it back home with you.

Then / Than

“Then” means “at that time”. “Than” is a conjunction used to compare others.

“This cabbage is different than that

“This cabbage is different then that cabbage”.

This seems like an unfinished sentence, and the further adventures of the second cabbage are yet to be explored.

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Words. The internet is full of them. Hell, the internet is made of them. Subtract the porn, explosives recipes and YouTube videos of cats and words are all that’s left of the internet.

Reading and writing astound me. Virtually every possible activity human beings do, they cannot help but get better at through experience. It just happens. Through trial and error, you learn what you’re supposed to do, and what you’re not supposed to do. With reading and writing, however, this doesn’t seem to apply at all. Teenagers spend hours in front of an internet covered with correctly spelled words, and come out years later as malformed byproducts of a society that accepts “getting the message somehow across” as a decent substitute for “being succinct, proper and correct in what you write”.

Anyway. I’m forming a nice little list of words that people continue to spell incorrectly, much to my chagrin, infuriation and despair. Here’s the first one. Enjoy. You may learn something.

Pregnate

We had sex, and I got pregnate.

This is clearly an example of confusion between the correct terms pregnant and impregnate, which, when bastardised together, do not form a third word. You are impregnated, at which point you become pregnant. I advise you to learn this before you inevitably raise another human being who can’t deal with this simple concept.

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Remember Katinka from a couple of posts back? Well, another of her entirely (I wager) fictional Russian bimboids has chosen to contact me. I reproduce in full the entire epistle, my favourite parts bolded for your mirth.

Hello not the man familiar to me!

I understand that you now are surprised that to you this letter has come. But I ask you simply spend 5 minutes of your time and read it and that it can probably change and your life and mine. At first I wished to be presented. My name to Anna me of 29 years I live in Russia in the Cheboksary of I not married. And never was married. I have finished school and arrived in medical college finished it and went to work in hospital but only me never I carried could find to
myself the man and me so it would be desirable it. And I looked as that in the evening the TV and saw that there spoke that in Russia 30 000 000 women which live without men and that there are such marriage agencies in which it is possible to address and in such agency to you
can pick up the man. I went to one of such agency and addressed to them with the request that they could find for me the man they spoke to me that this service paid and that I should pay about 1000 roubles.
At first I thought that it expensively for me but have then thought and solved that money for me it not important that I want happiness I want love I want the relation and I want a happy family what for to me money without a thing it and I gave this one thousand roubles. And they suggested me to get acquainted with the man from other country. I have solved why and was not present if I could not find the man from Russia such destiny can at me and I should search the man from another of the countries. And they gave me yours e-mail the address and spoke that you search to yourself the woman. I took all data and went to the cafe Internet as I am not able to use well the computer and it costs much for my payment from work. I came to the Internet of cafe and asked that to me created the address e-mail that I from it could write you the letter. And here now you can see my letter. I wrote you it with hope that you will answer. As I took two photos that you could see my appearance and to solve for yourself completely you would like to begin dialogue and relations with me. Only I ask you at once look at a photo esteem the letter think and solve precisely you would like with me correspondence to me the friend to me is not necessary I and which is ready for serious relations will be necessary to love which MAN and creation of a family I is possible I ask you very fragile person and if serious relations write to me tell to me are not necessary to you that is not present I will understand. And still I wished to speak to you that on a photo I turned out not so well as I did these photos at home and they turned out not so well as professional but you see me such as I look in a life. And you can precisely define such woman as I is necessary to you or not. Very big request Also would like if you nevertheless are interested in me that write to me about yours e-mail where we with you could speak and a little good photos you have gone to me. Here like and all that I wished to speak with you and now I only needed to wait from you for the answer and I hope that you will write that to me if I was not
pleasant to you or serious relations are not necessary to you let to me know.

Please reply only my personal e-mail: sfndksfnlkdnfskldnfksf

The lonely woman from Russia Anna

So there. After some deliberation, I managed to precisely define that I really have no need for a Russian bride with no computer literacy who has the audacity to have a goon at an internet cafe type such a desperate e-mail for her while she dictates aloud.

Besides, I don’t think my girlfriend would appreciate a skankbag Russian whore appearing on my doorstep

And I’d need a translator, anyway.

Or a gag.

Sorry, Anna. Or Roslyn. Or whatever. I suspect you’re a man, anyway.

She provided, as per ritual, not one but two photos of “herself”:

Nice orchid.

Ostensibly fashion is cheap in Russia. It’s not necessarily good, though. I bet that lace keeps her very warm in those brisk Russian winters.

I’d like to find the moron who invented e-mail and cram an “@” symbol up his quoit.

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Two Lynx products to complain about today.

Lynx Mixology

The concept is nice. You get two fragrances, you squirt them both at once and get a third fragrance from the combination. They smell quite pleasant on their own, and the third smell is just as decent, but the entire thing is clearly designed so you buy and consume two cans of deodorant in the time you’d otherwise use only one. An intelligent person would buy the set and use the scents one at a time, but when you have them in front of you, you can’t help but squirt them together as the can says.

Lynx Shock

Here we have a form of shower gel, in this case scented with “Glacier Water and Deep Sea Mint”. Basically, it’s shower gel with menthol in it. Menthol makes your balls feel like they’re immersed in liquid nitrogen. If that’s your thing, knock yourself out.

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I love spam e-mails. Enjoy:

Hi my friend!

I only wished to write to you the letter and to tell as in general my letter got to you! First I would like to speak a little about myself my name is Kristina to me 28 years I live in Russia to Kazan. All the others wash data and a photo in the appendix to the letter data. I was in agency of acquaintance and to me advised yours e-mail the address I do not know whence they him took but they gave me yours e-mail that I could have acquaintance to you. And I only wanted that you have spent about 10 minutes both looked wash a photo and wash data and received
from you the answer you would like to have acquaintance to me or you only would not like this? Tell to me I so only the nobility it much would like. Also I shall wait much your answer. I started to search the man as to me very alone and 28 years and I do not have man if you wish to begin with me correspondence or easier to begin acquaintance tell to me your answer. I shall wait much!

I hope your new friend well I hope that I can become for you friend
Kristina! Can you send me you photo and story life on my e-mail: **

P. S. My photo and all data are in archive. My e-mail: **

I’m assuming this is the worst machine translation I’ve ever encountered, because it seems as though it could have, once, been a legitimate missive. I’m quite fond of this e-mail. It’s spectacularly ambiguous. It waits until the last couple of sentences of gibberish before it alludes to “Kristina”/”Kristinka” being on the hunt for a man.

Anyway. There was a picture included. Nice curtains.

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Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan. They’re Scottish, they’re gay, and they do a spectacular job of decorating people’s homes. Usually without their permission. But they annoy me, slightly.

Together, they’ve made numerous TV shows about bad design ideas, how to decorate your home so people will buy it, and so on. Today, I’m focusing on two of their shows. One is a British series called “How Not To Decorate”, the second is a newer Canadian series called “Home Heist”.

The former of these series’ consisted of Colin and Justin appearing at someone’s poorly designed, badly executed and generally ugly home, and proceeding to renovate the Christ out of it until it resembled something awesome. This does not annoy me in any way.

The latter series is much of the same, with the part about the house being badly designed and ugly being substituted for the house being basically an average house, much like the one you’re sitting in now. This annoys me.

It annoys me because of the format of the show. The “plot”, as it were, of each episode is as follows.

Colin and Justin “break in” to the victim’s home. They mock everything within. Stealing a couple of artifacts, usually an ugly arm chair and a component of the poor person’s collection of dolls or beer bottles or something, they ambush the person at some point in their day-to-day activities. Usurping their house keys, Colin and Justin now begin re-inventing the home.

Along the way, they force the home owners to wear t-shirts with demeaning phrases on them, which I acknowledge is all in good fun. They also “teach” the home owners three lessons regarding parts of home decoration that they’ve decided the home owners suck at. Which, in many cases, is fair enough.

I’m also happy to acknowledge that the end result of all of this is that the home owners get a brand new, professionally designed interior over four rooms for nothing. I’m not oblivious to this.

The part that really jostles my coconuts is the way Mr. McAllister and Mr. Ryan mock people’s homes. I grant that in some cases, bad design prevails. In the vast majority of cases, though, it’s very clear that a lack of money has prevailed. For example, the family who’s baby daughter’s bedroom was also the laundry, complete with dryer. Same for the family who’s child’s room contained a fully fitted kitchen, minus stove. It’s not a case of someone deciding this would be a fantastic design move, it’s more a case of the home owners could not afford an alternative solution. It gets my goat when people are insulted for things that clearly aren’t their own choices or their own fault.

As I said before, I didn’t have a problem with the first show. It was British, the humour was more prevalent, and nine times out of ten, the homes actually were total home design disasters. For example, the house that had one room with alternating pink and black walls covered with fluourescent hand-prints. Yes, please, mock that. Don’t mock someone’s choice not to re-paint their home from the original beige, nor someone’s decision to keep hand-me-down furniture, nor someone’s decision not to store their crap away.

Oh, yeah. People’s crap. I take umbrage at this part, too.

Sure, yes, design-wise, having your belongings in your house is a horrible idea. It makes everything look messy. However, we don’t all live in IKEA catalogues, and it just so happens that we all own shit. And most of us want to see it. Not two items of it. Not just the items that match colours. I don’t consider it materialistic to want to own things that remind you of your life, and I don’t consider it bad design to want to display them, in any number.

I actually wonder how the people who own the homes Colin and Justin renovate manage once C and J have left and they’re left with the dilemma of re-assimilating their own belongings back into the (admittedly very nice) design they’ve been presented with.

The British version had a follow-up segment at the end of each episode showing how the home owners had adapted the final design to work for them. Canadian one doesn’t.

Anyway. I’ve ranted about two gay guys renovating houses for far longer than I really wanted to. I like the show, but it irritates me for the above reasons.

Hoorah.

Tags: Rants and Vitriol // 11 Comments »

This is awesome. I was just reading up on the Crossovers & Spin-Offs Master Page, which I’ll happily credit for everything I’m about to say. The CO&SOMP is a database of almost every case of two television series meeting that have ever occurred. There’s a whole bunch of nifty stuff on there, but I’m particularly fond of Group 10, the “Jean-Claude Van Damme is dead” group.

The group consists of the following TV shows: Bewitched, Crossing Jordan, Enterprise, Heroes, Knight Rider, Las Vegas, Medium, The Office, Passions, Star Trek, Star Trek: DS9, Star Trek: TNG, Star Trek: Voyager, Tabitha and Team Knight Rider

Thanks to an episode of Las Vegas in which Jean-Claude Van Damme made a guest appearance as himself, and was killed off as himself, he is now dead in that entire universe. This means that on Las Vegas, Passions, Crossing Jordan and Heroes, there can be no new Jean-Claude Van Damme movies, because he’s dead.

It’s bizarre and I love it.

Crossovers & Spin-Offs Master Page: http://poobala.com/crossoverlistb.html

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I’ve been reading a lot of reviews for Super Nintendo games, recently. Mostly because I have an annoying desire to force myself to like playing RPGs, and it’s not working very well. I hate leveling characters up. I hate fighting in role-playing games. I want to beat you up, not do math.

Anyway. Having read many reviews, I’ve come up with some pointers for anyone who plans to write their own and doesn’t want to come off sounding like a mentally retarded eleven-year-old.

1. Don’t pad your review out with twelve paragraphs about the game’s story. If you can’t summarise the plot of a video game in one paragraph, that’s a strike against the game, and you shouldn’t be dwelling on it. Or even worse, you shouldn’t be counting on it to increase your word count.

2. Don’t list things. It’s great that the game has thirty different weapons in it, but please don’t tell me about all of them individually.

3. Do not use any of the following phrases:

• “Why are you still reading this review and not buying/playing the game?”
• “Buy it! Buy it! Buy it!”
• “BEST GAME EVAR”

4. Learn to spell.

5. Please actually play the game you’re reviewing before you review it. If I had a dollar for every review I’ve read that focused on the first two levels of a game and nothing past that, I’d be wealthy. If you can’t play it past level two, tell us why. Don’t try to make up a review about parts of the game you haven’t seen.

6. Same thing goes for your screenshots. Don’t just include the title screen and the first level. Show us you played the game. Comment on the screenshots. Sell what you’re trying to tell us.

If you can take those six pieces of advice, maybe the internet will become a less embarassing place.

Also, upgraded to Wordpress 2.5. It seems pretty.

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I’d like to know which dickhead on the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles production team came to work one morning and said, “Y’know what this show needs? More ballet”.

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Okay. This thing’s been floating around the internet for at least a decade now, and I’ve just StumbleUponed (go grammar, go!) on two consecutive websites. Both of which were categorised as “photographs from nature”. This photograph is about as natural as the particle accelerator at CERN.

I speak, of course, of this:

I’d like to give the “photograph” credit, but I don’t know where it’s originally from.

Allow me to elaborate on exactly what makes this image fake. Bearing in mind I do know a little about what lightning is supposed to look like.

1. It’s yellow. Granted, some ridiculously incorrect white balance settings or damaged film may produce this effect. Either way, to have lightning (which is generally pure white, or tending to pink) appear yellow, the rest of the photograph should be so off-colour it would be very clearly a bad exposure. And it isn’t; the sunset is (lightning aside), a reasonable photograph. The pink colour of actual lightning is due to the nitrogen content of our atmosphere. For lightning to appear as yellow as in this photograph, we’d need to be breathing sodium.

2. Lightning generally comes from somewhere. Like, possibly, a storm. While it’s slightly cloudy in the photograph, there’re no real signs of inclement weather. It’s possible there could be a storm behind the photographer, but it’s unlikely a photographer intending to photograph lightning would face away from its source.

3. Lightning does not branch in an awkward horizontal fashion. Lightning seeks the shortest, fastest and most efficient path between the cloud and the ground. Generally, it branches only at the top of the strike, and weak branches terminate very quickly. Once a bolt has hit the deck, there’s no charge left in it to fire out the bizarre horizontal fingers this yellow thing has coming out of it.

4. It glows uniformly, and there’s a perfectly circular aura around the point of contact. It almost looks as if someone’s just tapped a Photoshop airbrush there. Gasp!

I’m sorry to whoever originally created this image. It’s a perfectly acceptible piece of Photoshoppery. I’m not sorry, however, to anyone who is convinced it’s a real photograph, because it is not.

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