Relevantly Irrelevant
A song discovered sifting through G-MuSiC, a copy of what Garret’s music collection looked like in 2011. It’s kind of sad that I have collected gigabytes and gigabytes of music from various people over the years that I’ve never actually listened to.
This song was written for when I more or less fall asleep these nights. Very soon it will be the exact time my alarm clock will be going off every morning.
Bonus: a happy and melancholy (bittersweet?) song written for crashed airliners.
Το καλό πράγμα αργεί να γίνει, είναι γνωστό, αλλά αυτή το φορά το παράκανα: Έναν χρόνο μετά, το podcast με τον Γκάρετ είναι επιτέλους ονλάιν. Ηχογραφημένο 6 Αυγούστου 2014 στο μπαλκόνι του Γκάρετ στην Γλυφάδα, πριν το μεγάλο βήμα του στον χώρο των games (είναι ο φίλος μου που δουλεύει στη Riot που αναφέρω όποτε και σε όποιον μπορώ για να κόβω αντιδράσεις!) και δεν τον έχω πολυδεί από τότε…
Αθεϊσμός vs «εναλλακτική» επιστήμης, ο κίνδυνος της εμπόλα (λολ), ιστορίες από τα Еnglish conversation groups και άλλες από το EVS στη Σόφια, ερωτήματα όπως «σε τι είναι χρήσιμη η νοσταλγία;», «τι θα γινόσουν αν μπορούσες να ξαναδιαλέξεις εναν διαφορετικό δρόμο;», «είναι χάσιμο χρόνου να παίζες games αν περνάς καλά;», «θα είναι το Angry Birds το Mario των hardcore του μέλλοντος;», «πώς θα είναι το facebook σε 50 χρόνια;», «θα ζούμε όταν θα γίνει η Ελλάδα έρημος;», «πόσο μπορείς να πιεις πριν οδηγήσεις;», «υπάρχει το Total Perspective Vortex;», «ποιό είναι το τίμημα μιας ζωής συνεχώς σε κίνηση;», «το Breaking Bad σε έκανε να θέλεις να δοκιμάσεις meth;», «ήταν μαλάκας ο Chris McCandless;» και άλλα πολλά. Μια συζήτηση για τα πάντα και τίποτα, ένα Ne-fest άνοιγμα μυαλών όπως συνηθίζουμε (και η αλήθεια είναι ότι μου λείπει τώρα που είμαστε πολίτες του κόσμου).
Ένα podcast μιάμιση ώρα για να γελάσουμε, να σκεφτούμε, να θυμηθούμε, και που αποκαλύπτει πολλά και για τους δύο μας που δεν μοιραζόμαστε απαραίτητα συχνά. Απολαύστε!
For Daphne and me, Breaking Bad has had a special meaning. We began watching the series last October. We pledged to only ever watch episodes together. I remember talking to Tomas in Capture Green in Prespes, him telling us he’s a chemical engineer and us joking about it. We were still in season 1.
As it happened, by last January, when I left for Sofia, we hadn’t even finished the third season. So in the past few months we could only watch episodes when we were either 1) physically together in the same room, whether in Sofia or in Athens, or 2) Skyping. The latter proved to be less than satisfying and too much of a hassle really – because watching Breaking Bad “together” also meant pressing play at the same time, pausing whenever the other person paused, waiting for the other person to get the episode right (my old laptop not capable of handling correctly any kind of video larger than the size a post stamp) etc. Meanwhile, Vicente, Miro and Garret all started watching it almost simultaneously and blew through it from end to end in a matter of weeks. We were still at the end of season 4 when Garret wrote this and this. Vicente overtook us somewhere around May and the beginning of season 5.
It really didn’t help that the series had its finale right before we started watching it, so we really had to be careful not to stumble upon spoilers scattered about by enthusiastic but careless watchers…
What I just wrote gave me some pause. What are the rules of spoilers? I had to go back and check one Idea Channel episode exactly on this that had caught my eye but I didn’t watch. Here:
No matter your position on the “Mitch and Greg to Emily continuum” (watch it and you’ll understand), posting something like “OMG! So-and-so DIED!” on your Facebook wall (as typically happens with the airing of each new Game of Thrones episode as well and leads people to Friends List culling) breaks every possible rule suggested. What goes through these people’s minds when they do things like this, unless they’re trolls, defeats me.
Anyway. A few days ago (on the momentous day of July 31st to be exact) we did it. We finally finished Breaking Bad. And it was good. It was heroic. We watched four episodes in a single day – can’t remember when the last time I did that was. No binge-watchers here, for better or worse… It’s amazing how many things I’ve started but never finished, if I get down to it. That I followed the whole series through, all 62 episodes of it, to the bitter(sweet?) end, hell, that alone speaks volumes when it comes to me. Sadly. Or not. I don’t know. It’s just the way I am I suppose: deriving pleasure from starting things – not bringing them to an end. For books it’s another story… but for series, or games, I am like this.
I don’t know what I can say. Explaining why things are good by dissecting them isn’t my forte at all. I can tell you such little tidbits as “I could never see it coming!”, “soooo suspenseful, so stressful!“, “the photography and direction were incredible“, “such strong characters!”, “I love Gus Fring, bitch”, “better call Saul!”, “where’s Miiiike?”, “everybody’s so fucked”, and maybe that’ll give you an idea.
I could also tell you that, unlike many other people who like to take pride in being able to figure out what will happen at the end of a given story, I’m typically quite bad at it. What I thought would happen at the end when we were watching the first few episodes had already happened by the end of season 2, so the actual seasons 4 and 5 were quite a ride through the unknown and unexpected.
Good thing I wasn’t spoiled.
For rounding off this mini-tribute, some more praise and discussion of the series.
Thanks Daphne for being my Watcher 2 (as in Player 2) for all these months.
We did it, bitch! And I 100% mean that!
I first got to know about Clutch fairly recently, and it was through Fanis; about this album, through Aris – Garret’s friend who now lives in Leiden. Good stuff. Thank you.
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A quick note before the review: my friend Garret got this book for me as a gift for my last nameday, and he was also the guy who first introduced me to Terry Pratchett years ago, so here’s a double “thank you” for him.
Now, the review.
I definitely should be paying more attention to Terry Pratchett. All four books of his I’ve read I have greatly enjoyed, and this one not only had as much Pratchettesque humour as I could ask for, it had a very serious and significant message to share as well. That’s probably the reason why my mentor here in Bulgaria, Boris, who I yesterday learned has read ALL of the books in the series, some of them twice, called it “one of the heavier books” set in the Discworld universe. It’s an opinion which I understand but can’t completely agree with. To clarify: it’s not that it wasn’t heavy compared to the other Discworld novels I’ve read, but to me this contrast just made the whole thing tastier. What can I say, I suppose that, myself being a man of contrasts, it feels more… balanced? Natural? Complete in a paradoxical way that makes perfect sense?
It just feels right.
So, what’s next? I will continue to crawl my way through the series like a turtle, of course, but now, with renewed motivation from Boris, maybe I can do it with less of Om’s slugishness and more of The Great A’Tuin’s grace(?).
Αντί ποστίου για τη νέα χρονιά -αν και δεν εγγυώμαι ότι δεν θα κάνω κάποιου είδους ανασκόπηση του ’13- σας παρουσίαζω το εορταστικό επεισόδιο “Πρωτοχρονιά ’14, The Party Experience”.
Αν αναρωτιέστε γιατί τη μία γράφω τους τίτλους στα ελληνικά κι άλλοτε στα αγγλικά, δεν έχω καλή απάντηση. Καλωσήρθατε στον κόσμο μου.
Το επεισόδιο περιλαμβάνει:
•Προσβολές για το εργαλειάκι από άπιστους
•Σχολιασμό πάρτι από καναπεδοκένταυρους
•Αναρώτηση της χρησιμότητας του χορού σαν είδος ερωτικής τελετής
•Ήχους ανοίγματος κουτακιού σόδας μπύρας
•Θόρυβο από τις -σίγουρα λιγότερο ενδιαφέρουσες!- συζητήσεις στο βάθος
•Μουσική, για να γίνει το πόδψαστ λίγο πιο ζωντανό! Βάλτε φτερά στα πόδια σας με αυτά τα beats από το παρελθόν!
•Αναφορές στην κολική δραστηριότητα του Κεμάλ Ατατούρκ
•Πιθανή προέλευση του ονόματος «Πανταζής
•Φιλοσοφική συζήτηση για το κατα πόσο η λογική είναι ο μόνος, ο καλύτερος -ή τελικά απλά άλλος ένας- τρόπος ερμηνείας του κόσμου.
Και πολλά άλλα.
To Cubilone’s Dimension δεν φέρει καμία ευθύνη αν η έκθεση σε αυτό το ηχητικό αρχείο σας προκαλέσει συμπτώματα παρόμοια με πραγματικής παρουσίας σε πάρτι, όπως: ξαφνική όρεξη για υπερβολική κατανάλωση αλκοόλ (και λοιπά φυσιλογικά συμπτώματα), συζήτηση με αγνώστους, επιθυμία χρήσης κινητού, τάσεις φυγής, κρίσεις ταυτότητας («γιατί δεν χορεύω;»), υπνηλία, αγάπη για όλον τον κόσμο, μίσος για όλον τον κόσμο, και άλλα.
Steam’s Autumn Sale 2013. Here we go again. Daily deals. Yesterday’s deals. Flash deals. Community picks.
There are 86 games in my account: most of them I’ve bought in different Humble Bundles or other sales, such as the ridiculous Holiday Sale of 2011. I’ve played less than half of them and even less than half of those have I “completed” – quotes because the games that I prefer nowadays are generally speaking impossible to complete. A relatively small fraction of those 86 games I got through Game 2.0 for reviewing. I don’t receive physical copies anymore, but I’ve long got over the need of owning real copies of games, especially after getting stuck with boxed copies of games that are tied to Steam keys and which I therefore can’t sell – I’m looking at you, stack of Total Wars!
This time around, you threw in our faces Skyrim Legendary Edition for 13€, Bioshock Infinite for 7.5€, Spelunky for 3€ and Civilization V Gold and the expansion Brave New World for 10€ each. Of all of the above I only resisted to buying Skyrim (it sounded very enticing but I doubt I can give it the time it probably deserves at this point), and still believe I will buy more games before the deals are over (eyeing Super Hexagon and Anno 2070). Only a fool would skip on those prices… And then you’re going to have the Holiday Sale, of course you will. I hope we’ll at least have enough time to enjoy Civilization V online with Garret and Daphne who both got the game the day before during the sale – actually, I got it for Daphne because she seems to love it so much; who would have thought that the hot seat would have grown this hot?
I feel as if I’m being manipulated to no end. It’s confusing to my Fi (ethical system/inner values to you MBTI beginners!) – which dictates that I should at least be trying to avoid being exactly like women going crazy in the shopping mall – as well as it is destructive to my wallet and my time management. You’re tearing me apart, Steama!
But seriously. What gives? How can this even work? How can you have 1532 sales every year without cheating all of the producers and developers? How is this system viable at all? I mean, with these sales and the existence and dominance of Humble Bundle, combined with the ridiculous prices games have at launch only for them to be reduced in a matter of months through these offers (and given the extreme oversaturation of the market), it’s no wonder top AAA games are slowly becoming obsolete. Given of course that people just don’t have enough money to spend on consoles (most of the people I know don’t want to buy a new console, either because of lack of interest, money or both), it’s really no wonder that you, with your cheap, flexible and robust system (and your upcoming Steam Machines) and iOS with its innovation and low prices are looking like you will together dominate the industry even further. And really, what would happen if everybody eventually stopped buying games on day one or – god forbid – stopped preordering like tiny little consumeristic muppets? I’ll tell you what would happen: the entire industry would collapse. Again.
You know something? As cool and comfy as it is, deep down it makes me feel uncomfortable having all of my games in this digital vault made out of thin air. Now you look healthier than ever, but will that be the case in 10 years? 20? You had your DRM creep on us and had us get used to it, and now we bash everyone who tries to steal some of your limelight (yes, I know it’s fun to hate EA and forbidden to even slightly criticise mama Valve). Even if you have allowed offline play, you have made reselling games impossible. Why? How can I trust you, Steam? These cheap games are like a trojan horse: you’re becoming the Google of gaming – people put up with your shitty monopoly because you’re just so damn useful. What if tomorrow I have to buy your SteamMachine to play? What if I suddenly have to, say, pay a fee to access my games – even just a small one? I’d probably pay up just in order to still be able to play 90% of the games I own or play on a regular basis (most of which I certainly won’t have played even by then). Oh, maybe you’re like the other great benefactor, Facebook, which promises that it’s free and always will be. Isn’t that a role model of a company.
Maybe I’m expecting too much – or I’m too sceptical/paranoid. Maybe my thinking is a relic from a different era, when physical mattered more – was more tangible – than digital. Maybe in this Brave New World there really will be no difference between offline and online, the physical and its digital counterpart. As far as I can see, the counterpart in many ways has already replaced the original or is indistinguishable from it (or they really are the same thing). The strictly private has become public, a single thought or utterance shared with the world is immortalised and pinned to its creator forever (or at least for what the word ‘forever’ means in the beginning of the 21st century). The social as well as the commercial sphere is changing too quickly for us to figure out, and, well, honestly we’re just not that smart to understand in what ways we’re being manipulated, controlled and generally taken advantage of at this time by “free” or seemingly harmless services. I hope you can understand, though: all these huge companies who are operating as monopolies (mostly in the digital plane) at the same time working with the secret services of the world or using us in other mostly unknown nefarious ways are just scaring me. No corporation can inspire my trust. That’s all.
I hope you can understand and won’t block me from playing Civilization V because I told you these things. You know I still love you. Right?
I’ve always had problems with keeping fit. It’s a matter of discipline and a lack of goals: in some of my older attempts I would go out and run in the Alsos, do some exercise maybe, stick to it for a few weeks but I’d quickly get bored of it or would lose motivation because there would be no actual goal – no, “getting in better shape” doesn’t count as a real, tangible goal.
Then one day about a month ago I was playing around with Garret’s iPod when my eye caught an app with a weird name: C25K. He explained that it was a program that gets you off the couch (or the desk chair, as is the case with me) and ready to run 5 kilometres in just 9 weeks by slowly adjusting the equilibrium between the jogging and recovery walking times – more of the latter in the first few weeks, almost exclusively the former in the later ones.
I can proudly announce that today I did my midway run: I have as much left as I have done already and I got me a pair of new running shoes as a reward (and an upgrade) for making it this far. Another 4 weeks to go in total. Next time it’s going to be 20 minutes of running straight. I’m pumped. Bring it on I say!
If anyone wants to get fitter (but be careful, it’s not a good way to lose weight because you tend to eat more to build up those leg muscles) and running sounds like something you might enjoy doing, get off the couch (or desk chair) and try C25K, it’s great.
For motivation: The Oatmeal: The terrible & wonderful reasons why I run long distances
Sometimes (often) it’s better to let others do the talking first:
Russians, Greeks, Finns and a camera
Written by Юниорский союз Дорога
June 14, a heavy-loaded bus left Petrozavodsk.
The bus was filled with valenki, maracas, kanteles, hats with earflaps, cameras and kids from the Doroga youth union. They were the participants of a project called “Creative photography in the Finnish wilderness”.
Nobody felt like sleeping the first night. So our group organized a music party with wooden spoons, rattles and maracas. The international audience was thrilled! The Greeks and the Finns were awake as well. The next day the camp was launched leaving no time to sleep at all.
Each participant had to make up a story on any topic. Henna and Sanna from the Steering group helped the participants do it.
Henna, a professional photographer, spoke about basic principles of working with a camera and helped writing a storyline for series of pictures.
The most important thing is to convey your own feelings and emotions but make it understandable to the audience – Henna said.
Sanna taught everybody how to observe face expressions and gestures of other people, nature and how to concentrate on own feelings.
The harder the work, the better the fun afterwards. Recreation was planned as well. The National park Koli met us at the third day with 300-meter rocks. The park turned out to be perfect for photo shoots.
For the last days of our stay we canoed to the other side of the Pielinen Lake to a place called Ellu. This journey was the most exciting of all. Both experienced canoe riders and newbies were canoeing together.
When we arrived to Ellu, a delicious lunch was already waiting for us. After that Sanna held a traditional observation training, where participants form couples, one partner closes his eyes and the other one watches him for 5-10 minutes trying to capture the slightest movements and face expressions.
This training is useful for those who take pictures and for the models, it helps them both relax and focus on own feelings. Due to this exercises pictures turn out relaxed and natural – Sanna quoted as saying.
After the training everybody went on with their business: some took pictures, and some just enjoyed beautiful Finnish landscapes. In the evening we went to the sauna and jumped in the lake, we also taught the Greeks how to bathe with sauna switches. They loved it!
The next day we set off back home. We had to finish our stories, chose the music and voice over. Half of participants hadn’t come up with their ideas yet. But then a miracle happened – each of us prepared beautiful short films about our thoughts, feelings and desires. Some were more professional, some – more personal. But most importantly – they were all very different.
At the final presentation of videos we all felt united due to overwhelming amount of emotions. It didn’t matter whether you were Greek, Russian or Finnish. Each told about the most important and personal things.
In the evening before departure we gave our new friends pins of the Doroga union to remember us by, and of course, we invited them to Karelia. The Greeks already promised to come.
Besides beautiful pictures, we gained experience of organizing international camps. The Doroga youth union is a participant of Matka.ru project. According to the action plan, in a year a new youth center will be constructed in Matkachi. And it will be our turn to organize camps. Lessons learned from the Hyvarila will come in handy.
Many thanks to all participants and especially to the volunteer Steering group – Henna Middeke, Sanna Valkepaa, Magdalena Wollhofen, Karina Sitnik.
Special thanks to the Youth in action EU program that funded the project “Creative photography in the Finnish wilderness” and to the international secretary of the Hyvarila Maija Eskanen who contributed significantly to the project application.
Natalya Yalovitsyna
Not feeling very prosaic at the moment so I’ll keep it short, sweet and interesting:
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Kickass black cat protagonist? Check. Intense and personal detective stories? Check. Fleshed out characters? Amazing facial expression? Check. Bitches, vixens, cats and other species of sexy female animals that would make any furry lover drool a little bit too much? Check. Blacksad picked a great idea and took it far. Not 5-starred because not fan of noirs, but let me tell you, if Blacksad couldn’t convert me, few other works would.
PS: Props Garret for lending me this.
