Being good at computer games

I remember, back when the original Doom was out, there being someone who could do the first level with the monitor was off. Because it wasn't that big a level, and things always acted the same, managing it would have been damn tricky, but not impossible by any means. I reckon that given enough practice I could manage it.

I cannot imagine ever being able to do what the person in this video is doing though.
First of all they're playing Tetris at top difficulty (i.e. reacting faster than I can actually see) _and_ only picking up four rows at a time. Then (skip to the five minute point, because this is unbelievable) they play tetris where dropped pieces become invisible. And winning. Because, one assumes, they're memorising where all of the random fucking pieces have dropped, so they can add the next random piece in the right place.
And _still_ doing it faster than I could reasonably play normal Tetris.

(cheers to devinjay for the video)

Privilege

There's been a meme going around about privilege, which was vaguely interesting in its own right.

More interesting, though, is the post here that heron61 pointed me at, about what kind of privileges make a difference at college/university level, including all sorts of things you might never have thought of.

I, by the way, am terribly privileged. Partially because of money, which was always there for the things that mattered when I was growing up. Which doesn't mean large amounts of expensive foreign holidays (when we went abroad it was usually in a cheap, off-season way - we went to Austria by coach, for instance). But it did mean that when I needed additional tutoring to get through my English GCSE it was possible, and when I needed another year to get my degree it was never going to be an issue. Of course, nepotism helped with cash too - because my father was a doctor when I needed a summer job I was working at the hospital without any problems. And of course, I was working in IT because my father was buying computers before they were either popular or readily affordable for the general populace.

The other, and much more important, part of my privilege was growing up with educated parents who had huge numbers of books, watched documentaries and generally made sure I grew up interested in the world around me.

When I was a teenager I remember one of my brothers telling me that the kids in their class did not believe that we sat around a dinner table each evening, eating together and talking about what we'd been doing that day, or anything else that occurred to us. We could ask my parents questions and generally speaking _they would know_. Most of the other kids were eating while staring at the TV. I can't quantify the difference this made to my life, but all three of us are now well educated and earning a fair bit more than the median UK income, so I'm not about to start complaining.

Now _that's_ how to explain it

Don't feel up to speed on US Presidential candidates?
_Do_ feel up to speed on Buffy villains?

This will match up your As with your Bs.

The Nightmare Before Just After Christmas (in 3D)

Ok - trying again.

Cinema. Nightmare Before Christmas. In 3D. IMAX. Cineworld on FountainBridge.

11:50 on Saturday morning.

Leave a comment if you're coming, so that other people can avoid coming, and complain that I prefer you to them.

Maximum Drama FTW!

Musically Speaking

I first used AudioScrobbler back in the heady days of 2003. But I stopped after a while, for a variety of reasons that I can no longer remember - probably because it just wasn't that useful to me, what with it recommending me music that I didn't have any easy way to get at.

However - I finally got around to upgrading to Last.fm, which is what audioscrobbler eventually turned into. And seems to work pretty well so far.

So it's going to have to learn my musical taste all over again (as the last time I had the plugin working was June 2006). And it looks like I'm doing much the same, as my taste is not what it used to be.

I've also realised what the method is for introducing me to new music. Morag gave me a CD with new music on a few months back, and I promised to listen to it. And _completely_ failed to.

And then we spent 8 hours in a car on the way to Skye. And the same on the way back. Plus several days there. Which meant I was forced to actually listen to the damn music.

And now I'm madly in love with "Black Holes & Revelations" (by Muse).

Which goes to show - if you want me to listen to music you need to hold me hostage somewhere and play it at me. Or at least stick it on in the background. Just don't lend it to me and expect me to get around to it...

The view from my street

As of midday today.

I love the way the ruined church looks there. And that you can clearly see the path up the side of Arthur's Seat.