205. Typo
Bahaha. Shit. I’ve been vaguely backreading past entries – I’ll say why in a sec – and I’ve realised that I shot myself in the foot horribly at one point. When talking about The Helix, I made fun of a Steph J for a failed grasp of English, before writing of Kam “Kam does wants to someone through the penpal system...”.

I’m going to leave that typo, because it’s funny, but really. God.

Why? Cos I’m revamping Tds4a Yesterday. Instead of being a copy of the Journal, it’ll just be past blog entries. And yes, there is a difference. Nothing pre-2007, for a start.


206. Phrasebook
I’ve been inspired to follow the example of some Doctor Who fans on Outpost Gallifrey – no, this isn’t going to be another post about Doctor Who! – by creating a phrasebook. The essential idea is to quote an oft-used phrase and then write the meaning underneath it. It’s quite simple and can (hopefully here) reap great benefits. And sometimes, not only are they beneficial in expressing opinions, they can also be used to wilfully point out our own (yes, mine too) flaws.

Anything after The Bends is utter crap.
I’m not prepared to accept that sometimes bands change.

Anything after OK Computer is utter crap.
I’m not prepared to accept that sometimes bands change. Oh, and I also somehow believe that Kid A was a completely new step for Radiohead and something to be reviled.

Anything before OK Computer is utter crap.
I’m sick of the mainstream, and am not prepared to accept that anything that sounds even remotely like rock can be any good.

OK Computer is overrated.
I’m sick of the mainstream.

I don’t think [insert here] actually fits into a genre.
Not only am I pretentious, but I’m a stupid berk who thinks “genre” roughly equates to “rules and regulations”.

Sci-fi is boring nerdy shit with spaceships fighting in space. Big whoop.
I’m ignoring the fact that it’s a genre, that not all sci-fi does this, and that I quite like Star Wars.

That was truly an awesome sci-fi concept.
I’m ignoring the fact that sci-fi doesn’t mean “spaceships fighting in space”.

That episode of [insert sci-fi here] was scientifically inaccurate.
I’ve missed the fact that it’s sci-FI.

That episode of Doctor Who was scientifically inaccurate.
I’ve missed the fact that Doctor Who’s a show about a bloke who travels in time and space in a wooden box that’s bigger on the inside than the outside.

The new Star Wars films are crap.
I’m at least old enough to remember The Phantom Menace coming out, and so therefore that qualifies me to compare the two.

House of Wax is terrible.
I can’t see beyond Paris Hilton.

Torchwood is adolescent sludge.
I can’t see beyond homosexuality on the show. Even though there’s no nudity or actual sex.

Reality TV is terrible.
I somehow believe that a genre can be inherently terrible.

Humanity is overrated.
I like to look at Coco Bandicoot porn.

I may be a man, but I have feelings, honest, and I respect yours.
I’m either gay, or lying and want a quick shag.

Videogames were better when I was a kid.
I miss the fact that Doom 2 let me shoot things without trying to tell me a story.

I think there’s too many cutscenes in the Metal Gear Solid games.
I forgot that you can skip all of them.

That’s unAustralian.
I don’t like it, and therefore my country doesn’t either.

That’s Australian.
That’s stereotypical and irritating.

Scary Movie was a hilarious parody of Scream.
I completely missed the point of Scream.

Heavenly Creatures was great; it had interesting direction, a good use of New Zealand’s brilliant scenery, a wonderful mix of realism and fantasy; a disturbing tale of what happens when two girls take their friendship too seriously.
I decided to watch this because I heard the words “Kate Winslet”, “lesbian” and “sex” in the same sentence.

Wolfmother’s new song is great!
I don’t know the meaning of the word “new”.

Jim Carrey’s performance as the Riddler in Batman Forever was too jokey.
I missed the point.

I don’t like black and white.
I’m going to dismiss an entire era of film/TV just because of the way things were at the time. Even if it was a stylistic and budgetary choice, ala Psycho. Also, I’ve never heard that Michael Jackson song.

I like Australian musicians.
I like musicians who come from Australia yet sound like reject Americans and Brits.

I don’t like classical music.
Yes, I’m still a gimp.

I don’t like hip-hop or rap.
I just can’t stop being a gimp, can I?

It’s the inside that counts.
Oops, Jim Carrey did this joke in Liar Liar, didn’t he?

The Beatles are overrated.
I’ve not heard all of their stuff and am going to judge based on some of their pop stuff.

The Beatles are underrated.
I’ve heard all of their stuff and can’t stand their pop stuff.

The Beatles’ pop stuff is overrated.
Actually, that’s fair enough.

That film that used Beatles songs recently is great.
I like the Beatles and therefore the film is great. I also liked Just Like Heaven.

I like things to be dark and film noir.
I don’t like plot or characterisation.

I like things to be sweet and believable.
I don’t like imagination or realism.

That band stole that riff from...
But I’m reasonably okay with the idea of sampling.

British comedy is weird.
I’ve never watched The Office, despite it being one of the most popular British programmes of recent years.

American comedy is too normal and boring.
I’ve never watched The Simpsons, despite it being one of the most popular American programmes ever.

Australian comedy is satirical.
Australian comedy takes potshots at people because the shows’ writers can’t think of any good jokes themselves. Australian comedy just isn’t funny.

Australian comedy just isn’t funny.
I’ve never seen The Micallef P(r)ogram(me).

This is a brilliant spoof.
I like to watch parodies and spoofs, because it makes me feel like I could easily do better than what’s being spoofed, even I couldn’t.

Bond films are misogynist and cheesy.
I have a point, but I’m caricaturing horribly, and am also wilfully ignoring the franchise’s good points.

[Insert album] is pretentious.
I don’t know what pretentious means. I’m fairly sure it means that something is crap the moment that it stops being completely realistic. I think analogies and similies are pretentious.

That’s an example of onomatopoeia.
I refuse to say words as simplistic as “BANG!” and “POW!”, and thus have to create a glorious and inherently clever new word just to describe such phenomena.

That’s a neologism.
I refuse to say “new word”, despite the fact that “neologism” is never even going to catch on in the way that this new word I’ve just mentioned is.

2001: A Space Odyssey is pretentious.
I refuse to accept that a film that’s blatantly about mankind venturing out into space should be about a) space and b) mankind. I’m also going to ignore what era the film was released in.

There’s a token black casting.
I’ve noticed that sometimes casting someone black can be tokenistic, so from now on I’m going to assume that casting someone black is always a tokenistic gesture.

David Tennant is just a pretty boy.
I can’t get over the idea that sometimes looks and talent can go together.

Musicals are crap.
I can’t accept the idea that films can have singing in them. Particularly because, personally, I can’t sing for shit.

Sylvester McCoy is a terrible actor.
He seemed unsure of himself in a hastily-constructed not-very-well-written season opener and misjudges some moments from time to time, and therefore I’m going to ignore the other 98% of his performance and say he’s terrible.

Comedians can’t act.
I think comedy is realistic.

Shakespearean acting is something to be revered.
I think tragedy is realistic.

Shakespearean acting is hammy and over the top.
Now excuse me while I go and watch Die Hard.

Home and Away has always had terrible acting in it.
I’m ignoring the fact that Naomi Watts and Heath Ledger kickstarted their careers through this show, as well as the fact that both this and Neighbours are one of the few ways that an actor in Australia can actually even kickstart a career at all.

Silence of the Lambs is one of the greatest films ever.
I really liked the scenes with Hannibal, even though they made up a small portion of the film, so I’m going to give the entire film a huge thumbs up based on that.

Leni Riefenstahl was a Nazi.
I’m ignoring the fact that she was a great director.

Leni Riefenstahl was a great director.
I’m ignoring the fact that she was heavily linked to Nazism.

Funny, it was Butterfree’s birthday yesterday.
I genuinely think you guys will give a toss.

Muslims are terrorists.
I’m an idiot.

Religion is something to be abhorred.
I don’t get it, so I don’t like it.

Ah yes, but a [insert religious person] here would say that...
Ah yes, the fact that you conform to such-and-such a group immediately makes your opinions void...

Australia is under constant threat from terrorism, as evidenced by the Bali bombings.
I’m ignoring the fact that a) only a few people died, b) Australia is nowhere near as important as we like to think, and c) it didn’t even happen in Australia anyway.

We’ll get the fundamentalist bastards who did this to our families!
I’m going to descend to their level. I also don’t mean this literally, because of course the actual suicide bombers involved in the incident would, you know, probably be dead.

People care about this issue; there were protests and everything. Things are going to change.
I still think we’re in the middle of the Vietnam War. I’m also ignoring the fact that more people turned up to line up outside the latest Star Wars films, and even that didn’t change anything.

George Bush is an idiot.
I got my political beliefs from Pink and Greenday.

George Bush is a man who can do no wrong.
Why are you all backing away from me?

The 80s were embarrassing and awful.
I didn’t grow up in the 80s and never actually experienced them, but I feel I can judge them from some bad hairstyles I saw the other day.

Psycho isn’t as scary a horror film as horror films these days. And the shower scene is overrated.
I’ve only seen the shower scene, and not the entire film. And when I do see the film, I’ll end up missing the point.

Little Britain is the most original comedy in ages.
I’ve never seen The League of Gentlemen.

All of those endless CGI kids’ films these days are boring. There’s too many, and they’re not as good as the classics.
I’m going to ignore the pointless two Lion King sequels, and the pointless two Aladdin sequels, and...

The special effects are crap.
I wish I could date the hottest women on the planet, too.

There’s too much emphasis on special effects. It’s style over substance.
I don’t understand that the direction of a film is central to its medium, and that the appearance of CGI doesn’t automatically bring a film down.

Kids’ films are over-sentimental and vomit-inducingly sweet these days.
But I cried during Milo and Otis. And Lassie.

Napoleon Dynamite is overrated and isn’t laugh out loud funny at all.
I missed the point.

I quote Napoleon Dynamite all the time, that’s how line-by-line hilarious it is.
I missed the point too.

Doctor Who is too silly.
I think The Matrix is serious and clever.

I like t.A.T.u. They’re a musically interesting band.
Ooh, girl sex and controversy...

‘Mayonnaise’ is the best Pumpkins song, and anything from Adore-onwards is crap.
I really, REALLY have no taste.

I really, REALLY have no taste.
Dom Kelly disagrees with you.

I’ve been inspired to follow the example of some Doctor Who fans off Outpost Gallifrey...
I’m sad and have nothing better to do with my time.

I’m sad and have nothing better to do with my time.
I believe that pointing this out will be knowing and clever and vindicate me immediately.

Well, I think that’ll be all. Best quit when one’s ahead. Bye!
I’m out of ideas.