Mixed Bizniss

I've been cooped up in my room like the timid introvert I am recently, and it's the fault of two fascinating diversions. I've created a 2007 edition of the famous Andrew Roff Best Songs Ever compilation, and it's pure listening ambrosia. (aside: I tried to export the tracklist, but iTunes will only spit it out as a poorly formatted .txt file or a poorly formatted .xml file. I need a stylesheet to get it on to a web page).

The other demand on my time is a new mod I downloaded for Civilization IV. It's called the 'Realism mod' and it's meant to give players a more accurate simulation of combat, diplomacy and technology advancement.

So far it's been fun if a little anachronistic - in 400BC, playing as the Chinese, I used my generals Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein to invade Japan. That's realism for you in this post-modern world, I guess.

In other news, I got the reading list for my elective uni topic 'Law and Literature' yesterday. It seems we'll be spending a couple of lessons discussing Isaac Asimov's I, Robot stories. That is so wicked. We're studying a lot of other cool stuff too, and other law students have said the topic's basically run like a book club. I already know what I'm going to do my assignment on: Arthur Miller's play The Crucible.

Guitar Hero News
Seems I got some dates mixed up in the rules I posted a while back. Song selections have to be in by Sunday 15 July, and the contest will be on Saturday 28 July (I'd said Saturday 29 July, which is just wrong). I've made the appropriate changes to the rules.

I was feeling confident about my chances, but my Playstation's broken and I won't get it back until next Monday at the earliest. So Chris has a golden opportunity to get a headstart on me. Song selections should be interesting...

My favourite writing dude

There are a lot of authors that I hold in the greatest of esteem. If I had to pick a favourite it'd probably result in a four-way WWF-style cage match between Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Stephen Donaldson and James Clavell. The two 50s sci-fi writers would probably have an edge because they've been dead for a number of years and would therefore be possessed of some super zombie powers. Though, come to think of it, when you hold people in great esteem, you probably shouldn't exhume their corpses and reanimate them to amuse the lowest elements of American 'society'.

Even hypothetically.

Anyway, I feel like I'm losing the thread of the original point I wanted to make. And that point is this: most of the authors that I admire write in a style that I could never hope to emulate. I'll never have the effortless knack of 'clear glass' writing that Asimov does; nor could I build tension or evoke sympathy for an anti-hero like Donaldson.

But then there's this guy, Chris Onstad, who's responsible for what I think is the cleverest writing I've ever seen on the 'net. He's the creator of the Achewood comic strip (awesome in its own right), but like a lot of online comic writers I actually enjoy his blogs even more than his comic strips. His style is idiosyncratic, but I can't help thinking it's achievable. I could write like that if I really wanted to, and made repeated concerted efforts. At least, that's my theory. So have a read of his stuff, particularly this amusing little golf memoir, and revelations about his ancestry

A final thought: what a dynamic, thriving little blog this is turning out to be! My favourite alliteration for today is "predeliction for this particular pleasantry". Possibly the best thing that Alice has ever written; my earnest hope is that she somehow managed to slip that phrase into her thesis.