Darfuria

I have been reading a lot of written things lately, and I mean a lot. As a result of this, my current annoyance (which I have blogged about before, I’m sure) is excess punctuation. I mentioned before that I really like it when you see neat paragraphs of text with nice line-spacing that is generally written nicely. It looks nice, and it makes me want to read it. However, what I can’t stand is when you see paragraphs of text with line breaks in the wrong places, or people using 5 or more question marks when they only ask one question.

I know I’m quite sensitive and critical on the topic of writing, especially when my writing is far from perfect itself, but I believe I get most of the basics down pretty well (except for the occasional typo when I’m not thinking properly).

I’m just saying that it’s ugly, and completely unnecessary, to write something and then flood the page at the end of the sentence with loads of exclamation marks, question marks or dots. When I Google-searched exclamation marks, I found myself at this page, which is worth a quick read.

Just as a quick note. An ellipsis has three dots. Not more. Not less. Stop wasting time. You asked one question; use one question mark.

I have been toying with this idea in my mind for a week or so now, and finally decided to jump into it and register the domain name when I saw that it was available.

As a video gamer, I am always interested in knowing what video games are being released, and what video games are on the horizon (in development). However, the only websites I can think of that releases this information are the multi-news/reviews websites, which are often cluttered.

Therefore, my idea is to write a system which scans the data on these websites and publishes it on my website, linking to the source, with nice icons and such. Further, any official game release announcements I’d like to populate a calendar, which could be displayed on the website as “Upcoming Releases”, or something. I’d obviously then have an RSS feed system where a reader could select what platforms they want to subscribe to.

I think this is an excellent idea, and the final aim is to have a pretty much self-powered website which doesn’t require a lot of time devoted to it, with a large reader base. Promoting the website would be fun, and might cost a bit of money, but if I could affiliate with other gaming-orientated websites along with putting some sort of advertising system (Google Adwords) on there, it should pick up.

Anyway, it is all very well announcing it, but some serious learning is ahead of me.

Haven’t had a lot of things to blog about recently.

I missed my chance to take a picture of the packaging for the Zen Car Charger I ordered for my Mum’s friend that said “Wireless Accessories” on it, when it clearly had a cable inside.

Today’s amusement, however, was quite funny:

I went to the bathroom, and left the door open. I had been working on my Mum’s blog all day, and everytime I opened the door she shouted up the stairs to ask me a question. Obviously nothing was different this time, however, I proceeded to go to the bathroom as she shouted her question up the stairs:

“Dan! Is it an ISP number or an IP number?”
“IP!”

I then burst out in a fit of giggling at the irony of me shouting “IP” as I was peeing. Oh dear.

In other news, I want lots of money to spend on clothes. However, it looks as if I’ll be needing some sort of new storage solution for them, as my cat, Bo, just managed to break the bottom drawer of my wardrobe. The wardrobe has (had) three drawers at the bottom of it. One of them broke due to someone, who was possibly intoxicated, falling into my wardrobe. So that was the end of the bottom drawer, but the other two still remained. Then, just a minute ago, Bo decided to explore the space under the other two drawers and then thought it would be cunning to try and climb into the second drawer from the back, which proceeded to snap with the sound of splintering wood. Bo emerged looking slightly dusty, yet partially fiendish also; the little bastard.

The number thirteen is believed to be an unlucky number. I have never really been a follower of this common understanding, and I have never seen why people believe it to be unlucky. Perhaps it is because no matter what number you divide it by (2/3/4/5/6) there will be one “unlucky” number left over. However, more and more am I beginning to understand that either the common notion that thirteen is an unlucky number is true, or I am haunted by quite the coincidence.

6 years ago we moved into house number 13, and it changed my life. I was 12 at the time, and at the age when evenings after school, weekends and school holidays would be spent playing with the neighbourhood kids outside. However, we moved away from that, and whilst my Mum said it was “but a bus ride away”, things were never the same again. I used to hate her for that, but then I realised that moving here made me the person I am, and without it I doubt I would have become anything like I am now, so really thanks are in order.

However, moving here and becoming who I am now was hardly an easy-ride, and I still hate every day of waking up and coming home to this house. For me, the last 6 years of living in this house have been the foundation of so much negativity in my mind and heart. There has been a lot of tension between people in the house, and a lot of arguments. It’s not anything that can be helped, and everyone is to be blamed for it, really. However, I really think that to break away from these ever-occuring arguments that this house causes people to get involved in, number thirteen just needs to be left behind. Unfortunately I am torn between a few choices because if I move out, Marieke wouldn’t be able to come and visit. Also, I can hardly afford to move out comfortably on an apprenticeship wage, because it’s crap. Further, my Dad may be leaving the country later in the year, and if that is the case then I would be paying to live in the house he lives in.

For the past 3 years or so I have found myself on an edge of something. An edge which I often get closer to crossing, but never actually cross. Everytime I get close to crossing that edge, it is due to getting very angry or upset, something which can happen quite easily recently, as I am very irritable. I don’t know why this is, I think it is just because I want so much in my life to be different, yet I know that I just have to play the fickle waiting game with life until things can be changed.

Perhaps leaving everything that has happened here behind and getting a fresh start in a place where I wouldn’t have to remember the raised voices, I wouldn’t have to put up with the idiots I lived around and I wouldn’t have to get constantly pissed off with public transport would be for the best, however, due to being torn between leaving now or later, I’m really lost in what is going on, in a sense.

Sometimes I just can’t help but lose my temper. Everyone gets like it sometimes, I just get like it more often than others, and I am truly sorry for the people that I affect when doing this. I guess I just spend too much time with my thoughts dwelling in the future that when I realise it is the present, I am irritated by it. I should really find something that calms me down, but I think I’m far too heavily dependant on things being the way I want them to be.

I have mentioned before that I get really wrapped up with numbers, and how they relate to other numbers, and people, and all sorts of crazy things. I live at number 13. There are 13 steps going up to my bedroom. There are 52 steps going from the path to my house, or 78 steps if you go from the road below the path. Both numbers are multiples of 13. I could scare everyone by going deeper into the freak-obsession I have with numbers by saying things like 5+2 (from the two numbers in the 52 steps I walk up and down every day) equals 7, which is my unlucky number. Or 5×2 = 10, and 1+0 = 1, which is the unlucky number that 13 equates to when you try to divide it. However, I wouldn’t want to scare you, would I?

I’m just getting really, really tired, and quite depressed, actually, because of all of the arguments I have to hear and be frequently involved in. I honestly think this house is haunted, and have more than one reason for this. However, I can hardly blame my constant anger and argumentativity on a house. I just want to escape and never have to see it again, and I can’t wait for that day. Really, I can’t.

Well, after all of that messing around with passports and such, I have finally booked my flights from Exeter to Dublin, and leave on July the 2nd. Flybe charged me a bit more than I thought they would, the tickets setting me back a few pounds over £200, but nevermind; it’ll be worth it.  I just need to wait a couple of days to know that the money has cleared, and nothing has gone wrong with paying online with my electron card. This shouldn’t happen anyway.

I don’t normally write about the changes I make to my blog, as they are all tracked in the updates page (which you probably don’t look at anyway), however, I have made a few changes recently.  I have upgraded to WordPress 2.2, which should make things run a little smoother. I have also changed to a 3-column version of this theme which is nice, and allows you to see the various side menus without having to scroll. Fuck resolution friendly websites.

Also, I’ve done some CSS3 on the comments. If you are using Internet Explorer then you won’t see the CSS3 changes, as CSS3 is only really supported in Firefox right now, as well as parts of Safari. However, if you are using Firefox (as you should be) you will notice that there are some pretty rounded corners on the comment lists. I know they don’t look perfectly smooth and round, but the fact that they were generated with just a couple of lines of code instead of using images is excellent.

I’ve also changed the font in the comments, and changed the line height, and generally a few other design things. Everything is looking rather nice right now. Yum.