2097 Words

In this country, if I went to a major tobacco company with ideas like these for their "stop littering" campaign, I'd get strip searched by their security guards for Jeremy Beadle's hidden cameras as they removed me from the premises. If I took them to Japan Tobacco inc, I'd get paid fuck loads of money and I'd have offers of no-strings attached sex from 18 year old girls who model at car shows. They really are years ahead over there.

Note to self: move to Japan and forget everything you learned in A level media studies.

Diary of a Broken Xbox

Step By Step Instructions On What To Do When You See The Red Ring Of Death

Day 1

First thing you need to do is panic. Turn it off, then turn it on again. Panic some more. Check the wires at the back, which of course are fine because it was working 5 minutes ago.

Next Google "red lights on front of Xbox" which leads you to the the Xbox website. The instructions here are "turn it off for 10 seconds then turn it back on". Brilliant. Leave it for the rest of the day and get drunk instead. During this period it's normal to keep panicking, interspersed with periods of sorrow and regret. You'll keep remembering games you were in the middle of finishing, high scores on guitar hero, rankings on Rainbow 6, your place on the global leaderboard for Bomberman Live. All of these things may or may not be lost forever, and will require more drinking if you're going to sleep tonight.

Day 2

Wake up hungover and instinctively reach for the Xbox controller, which due to wireless functionality is kept permanently on your bedside table. Feel anger at Microsoft when the realisation hits you that it's dead. Spent the rest of the day denying that you're bothered, as you've barely played it for ages anyway. You'll probably need to drink some more so go to Tesco and buy some alcohol, and probably cigarettes. Later that day, have the sudden idea of unplugging it then turning it back on after 10 seconds (this is the kind of thinking that might get you a job at Microsoft customer support), before deciding that it's clearly never going to work, doing it anyway, and hating yourself for being right. Again. You'll need to text your friends to break the news, at which point you'll discover that most of them don't care in the slightest.

Day 3

Check the website again to make sure you've not missed anything. You haven't. Pick up the phone and call customer support. The person on the other end of the phone has a weird accent, try not to spend too much time figuring out where they're from; you're going to need to concentrate. This is an important call. They'll ask you to turn it off and wait for ten seconds before turning it on. Consider suggesting to them that they need a new angle of "support", but instead explain that it's been turned off for 2 days before doing it anyway. Fail for the rest of the call to understand anything that's going on, except the 5 minutes it took just to give them your email. They'll instruct you to wait for an email which will contain a UPS mailing label and further instructions. Thank them for their help, in your most polite manner possible, before hanging up the phone. Now realise that you have no idea what you're supposed to do next.

Flux Capacitor (not included)

This might be the worst book of all time. I haven't actually read it but I picked it up in Borders once, attracted by the words "time travel" on the cover. I'm a big fan of science fiction and instantly gravitate towards certain words or phrases like a Pavlovian dog, eager to drool over the hyperbole filled synopsis. I found this story distressing however, as the final word in the title became apparent: "wife". I read the back of the book just to check.

So let's get this straight, it's not a story about a man who can travel through time, it's a story about his wife. Who can't. Now I'm no writer, but given the choice of writing a story about someone who's adventures span time itself, or writing about their chronologically impaired spouse, I know which one I'd choose. I imagine it's full of the hideously mundane things she gets up to to pass the time until her husband gets home, like the time he travelled back in time to ancient Greece, but all she did was go to Tesco to look at cheap DVDs.

Do yourself a favour and give this book a miss. I did, and I've never looked back since.

Sabotage

I'd love to know how the moustache got ruined. It used to be the manliest, most awesome facial hair in existence. In fact just having a band of hair across your upper lip was all it took to make you look like the most virile, bad-ass, masculine bastard in the world. It was like a sign to Women Everywhere that you were so full of testosterone that it'd be dangerous to even make eye contact. At some point it all went wrong though, and nowadays at best you'd come off looking like a scout leader or some 80's throwback. Why does no one want to follow in the footsteps of men such as Burt Reynolds, Tom Selleck, or Apollo Creed for fuck's sake?!


At least Jason Lee's keeping the dream alive. When I get some time off work I'm going to grow a moustache. It'll be so fucking awesome. I bet I get a shitload of requests to be my friend on Facebook once I look like Burt Reynolds.

Edmonds, You're A Dead Man!

Fuck Noel Edmonds. What a smug cunt. There's nothing worse when your having a night out than having Edmonds spoil it all by fucking you over. I think it's high time he gave me back some of the money that he's stolen from me over the past year, on the grounds that he's a cheating bastard. I enjoy the fact that he's become a hate figure to anyone who's played that fucking Deal Or No Deal machine in the pub. One day we're going to read about how his house got burgled whilst he was away filming some Christmas special for Children In Need and we're all going to laugh, knowing that the universe has delivered it's own brand of cosmic justice.

And I hate his fucking beard.

What a cunt.