Sometimes I’ll ask my nephew what he did on a given day and he’ll go on at length about a video game. He’ll tell me how he beat his best time on a race track, or slew some many-tentacled bugaboo, or defended the Earth against aliens (or defended aliens against the Earth, depending on the flittering political affiliations of an 11 year old).

And I don’t judge him for spending his day in these ephemeral pursuits because I’ve been a video game kid since way back when I was still a kid and they were still called video games. Of course, when I was a kid video games were made out of rocks and wooly mammoth bones, but we were happy.

Even so, when my nephew tells me he defeated some Boss to acquire the Golden Ring of Whatchamacallit, I’ll sometimes think: “No, you didn’t.” The fact is, the activity of playing video games isn’t actually an activity at all. That’s the big lie of video games: the illusion of activity. You aren’t really racing cars, slaying dextrous bugaboos, or defending (or attacking) Earth. You aren’t exploring new lands. You aren’t playing hockey. You aren’t using your shotgun to defend people against zombies. You aren’t even playing. Not really.

What you are doing is sitting down, staring at flashing lights and wiggling your thumbs on command. Go you.

I’m not saying that’s necessarily a bad thing. I like video games, too. A lot. I’m probably playing them right now while you’re reading this. But I still judge you a little bit because I imagine you play them more than I do. Also, as I wrote earlier, I tend toward hypocrisy. I prefer to think it’s part of my charm.

So what’s the difference between video games and, say, reading a book? With reading, aren’t we really just sitting still and turning pages? We don’t really explore new lands or fend off zombies while reading a book. Well, not unless we are extremely good multitaskers.

It’s true that when we read a book we aren’t doing much in real life, or IRL as the internet kids would say. (Handy tips for old people: IRL = “In Real Life”; WTF = “Where’s The Food”; OMG = “Odin’s Manly Goats”; LOL = Something about your mother.) But nonetheless I think there’s a difference between the kind of nothing we’re doing when we read and the kind of nothing we’re doing when we play video games. It’s an active nothing versus a passive nothing. This is probably the most Zen I have ever sounded in my life. If I wasn’t writing this in boxer shorts I’d be indistinguishable from a wizened and serene monk. Well, a wizened and serene monk with a Mac Pro and a penchant for point-and-click adventure games. But still, wizened and serene, you know?

Anyway, my highly Zen point is that with books we are actively engaged in a way we aren’t with video games. That may seem counter intuitive considering the adrenaline rush that games can give us. I know it’s akin to the old cliche that hearing something on the radio is more active than watching it on television, reading something in a book is more active than hearing it on radio, and doing something tonight while surrounded by paparazzi is more active than seeing yourself in the tabloids tomorrow. But just because something is an old cliche doesn’t mean it’s not true. Paris Hilton is an old cliche and she’s real, much to my eternal disappointment.

[aside]

Why oh why do I even know who she is? I hate the thought that part of my brain is still being used up to retain knowledge of her existence. If I don’t have room left to learn Spanish because of her, I’m going to be so mad.

[end of aside]

Video games, particularly the twitch-and-shoot kind, are remarkably passive activities for ones that involve such an increase in heart rate. I wonder what kind of effect that has on us? Do we feel less need to do other activities because, at least chemically, we feel we’ve already accomplished so much? (“I think I’ll write the Great Canadian Novel … but then again, I’ve already claimed a foreign land in the name of the Empire today. Maybe I’ll just have a nap instead.”)

But I suppose the same thing is said every time a generation embraces some newfangled medium. It was the same with the player pianos. It was the same with the talkies. It’ll be the same when my nephew’s kids inject virtual reality simulations directly into their brains. With each paradigm shift, the older generation looks upon the younger and weeps for the loss of so-called real entertainment, real relationships, real communication, real culture, real sex, real food, real reality…

As for me, I’m not all that worried about us. We’re having fun, and that’s gotta count for something. Doesn’t it? And the Golden Ring of Whatchamacallit is kinda swell. Besides, it would seem that it takes a very long time for our brains to atrophy.

So I continue not judging my nephew (and, sometimes, not you either) for prostrating before the console game gods, but I also can see that I’m right on the cusp of telling you meddlesome kids with your jazz music and loose morals to stay off my lawn.

And get a haircut!

Canada will soon hold its 39th General Election, and I’m not going to vote. That’s not because of apathy, but rather because I really care about my country’s government and I do not think anything currently on offer is good enough.

The incumbent Liberal Party are involved in what the media calls a “scandal,” but in layman’s terms it’s simply that they stole from the Canadian public and got caught (which is basically what prompted the upcoming election). What message would I be sending if I gave my vote to a party that had just been caught stealing from me? I cannot reward a corrupt government. I would be foolish to do so. I will not vote for the Liberal Party.

The New Democratic Party is fiscally irresponsible. By “irresponsible” I mean “insane.” Their long-term goal is a multi-trillion dollar deficit. I am an uncle, and my 8 year old would be justifiably disappointed in me if I voted for a party that would saddle his generation with such an unfair burden. I would be selfish to do so. I will not vote for the New Democratic Party.

The Conservative Party is against gay marriage. The official party position is something like “we wouldn’t forbid a vote on it, and I guess we won’t actually (i.e. publicly) insist that our party members vote along party lines.” That is not enough. This is a basic human rights issue, no different than giving women the vote or abolishing slavery. It doesn’t matter that I’m not gay or a woman or a slave. I cannot vote for a party that doesn’t take a simple, clear “this is right, we are for it, period” stance on a human rights issue. I would be ashamed to do so. I will not vote for the Conservative Party.

The gaggle of small alternative parties are all equally ridiculous and/or offensive in either their fiscal policies or their social policies, or often both. Each one takes at least one fundamental stance that I can neither abide nor support. I will not vote for them.

So my choices boil down to: feel foolish, feel selfish, or feel ashamed. I do not want to feel any of those ways.

There is also another issue. An important issue. I do not trust politicians. I bet you don’t trust politicians either. They lie. They cheat. They get involved in graft. They hedge. They change their supposed beliefs according to poll results.

Transparency International (a Berlin-based group that tracks global graft) found that Canadians believe political parties are the most corrupt institution in our country. And this was before the Gomery inquiry into the Liberal Party’s recent graft scandal. Plus, over a third of those Canadians polled were sure political corruption would increase over the next three years.

So we mistrust our politicians. We think they are liars and cheats. This is not new, and it is not news.

But shouldn’t it be?

How did we get to a point where we accept so readily that our politicians are dishonest? We satirize them, we complain about them, we roll our eyes and furrow our brows and sometimes even scowl our scowls. But we still vote for them. Or sometimes we just give in and vote against the ones we think are the worst.

That’s not good enough. I don’t want to vote against anyone. I want to vote FOR someone. But I don’t have anyone to vote for, not really. Any vote I could cast would compromise my beliefs. With this ballot, all choices are selfish or irresponsible or shameful.

But I’m also not allowed to vote “none of the above.” In Canada, it is illegal to spoil your ballot. In fact, it’s a federal offense. According to section 167(2)(a) of the Canada Elections Act, “no person shall wilfully alter, deface or destroy a ballot.” Subsection 480(1) of the Act also provides that every person is guilty of an offence who, with the intention of delaying or obstructing the electoral process, contravenes this Act.

The electoral process does not permit me to register both my willingness to vote and also my disgust and disappointment in our politicians. I can only stay home and be lumped in with those too apathetic to vote.

Or I could run for office myself. But I wouldn’t vote for me, and neither should you. I am slothful and arrogant and selfish and spiteful and egotistic. And I watch a lot of porn, sometimes the really dirty kind. I disdain the leaders of most other countries, and couldn’t resist telling them that to their faces. Half the world would be on my no-trade list. I would abolish copyright, limit patents to 5 years, remove all tax benefits for religions, legalize pot, criminalize pans, and introduce the death penalty for DVD region codes. Or so I assume. More likely I would be easily bribed, and I would abuse power readily and eagerly. I’d probably end up selling Manitoba for some magic beans.

What the hell kind of slogan could I run under? “Vote for Carrington: he’s never killed a man just to watch him die.”

Which is why I’m not fit for public office. But neither, I would argue, are those politicians we are being asked to elect. And that’s the point: they are unworthy of our votes.

So they won’t get mine. This Monday the only thing I will have to say is “not you, not you, not you” to everyone on the ballot. But since I’m not actually allowed to cast my vote that way, I will turn my back on the lot of them.

I will not vote foolishly. I will not vote selfishly. I will not vote ashamedly.

I will not vote at all.

What a bummer, eh?

There are oodles of movies I saw and disliked in 2005. Some I disliked a lot, like Dark Water and Bewitched, and some I disliked a LOT, like Boogeyman and Alone In The Dark. (It just wouldn’t be a Worst Of list without a Uwe Boll film, would it?)

And then there are the ones that I actively hated—yes, even more than Boll’s bollocks. These films were the ones that actually hurt to watch. I squirmed, I scowled, I scolded myself for not being more discerning. I’m part of the problem.

C.R.A.Z.Y. makes the “give me back my three hours” list. An awful, plot-free, pretentious, and trite film. I only stayed past hour 1 because I was there with friends. I only stayed past hour 2 because I was their lift home.

Diary of a Mad Black Woman is on my “Jesus, would you just shut up about Jesus already” list. Minute after painful minute mixing God Is GREAT messages with fart jokes.

Kicking and Screaming tops the “aren’t comedies supposed to be funny?” list. Humorless garbage that any 8 year old would have found insultingly puerile. Well, any 8 year old except the one who wrote it.

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Suck, like the two toy commercial prequels before it, is dead to me. Mention it not.

There was also a litany of films I didn’t see that I’m sure would have made the Worst Of list if I’d been suckered into seeing them. 2005 was the year of Miss Congeniality 2, and Supercross. It was the year of Elektra and Fantastic Four. It was the year of Doom. It was the year of The Ringer.

Tell me again how piracy is the reason movie revenues were down?

Compared to 2004, 2005 was The Year Of Suck as far as movies. Weekend after weekend, regurgitated tripe was shunted in and back out of cinemas as fast as possible to make room for the next ladle of slop.

But as always there were some bright spots. There were some films worth watching, worth keeping.

I tried to come up with a Top Ten list, but I couldn’t. There just weren’t two handfuls of fingers worth of great films last year. Frankly, I padded my list to come up with seven, one of which I just saw today so perhaps I’ll yank it back off the list once it stays with me a while.

But here are 2005’s Moderately Magnificent Seven:

1. Oldboy
2. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
3. Me and You and Everyone We Know
4. King Kong
5. Good Night, and Good Luck
6. Sky High
7. Kung Fu Hustle

Some of those will make the Big Boys’ lists of best films, and some won’t. But everyone is wrong except me. Oldboy was the best film of the year: original, interesting, shocking, daring, exciting, intelligent…damn near perfect. It has the single best fight scene I’ve ever seen on film, and it has a double-whammy ending that truly rewards attentive viewers.

There were a handful of films that I enjoyed and which almost made my list, but the above seven seemed far enough distant from the pack to deserve their own list. I’d give “alphabetical honorable mention” for 2005 to:

• The Beat That My Heart Skipped
• Crash
• A History of Violence
• Millions
• Murderball
• Schultze Gets the Blues
• Serenity
• Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Partly for those of you keeping track at home, but mostly for my own notes, there were a few films I didn’t see last year that may retroactively make my Best Of list once I do see ‘em: The Best Of Youth; Memories of Murder; Godzilla Final Wars; Breakfast on Pluto; and Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.

I’m not above a little Russian revisionism, so if you come back to this page in a few months don’t be surprised if the Moderately Magnificent Seven has expanded to the Predominantly Pleasing Eight, the Substantially Satisfactory Nine, or even the By And Large Bearable Ten.

This article was originally posted in five parts between November 22 and December 14, 2005.

Part One

I have to write a novel. Not only do I have to write a novel, but I have to write it in time. In time for what, you ask? (Or you would ask if this was a conversation. But it’s not. So stop interrupting.)

At the end of high school I had an English assignment to write an essay about the future, or about my future, or something like that. Maybe it was about your future. Whatever. I wrote about me.

Specificaly, I wrote about why I wanted to be a writer. There’s no use quibbling or pretending I meant something vague that might include blogger or screenwriter; by “writer” I meant “author,” and by “author” I meant “novelist.”

My essay was one of three winners for a contest I didn’t know I’d entered. My teacher submitted the essay for me, and I only found out about it when I learned that I was one of the winners. The winning essays were placed in a time capsule in the Xerox Tower building here in Toronto (in what was North York back then).

As far as I know, my essay still sits encased in a clear plexiglass shell in the lobby, along with silver medalist Shawn O’Sullivan’s boxing gloves, a program signed by the cast of Cats, a book by Timothy Findley, and a letter from mayor Mel Lastman to the future mayor of North York (it begins, “Dear Myself…”)

That time capsule has become one of the defining things in my life. That public declaration of my biggest creative goal gave me a fixed deadline to measure my success or failure. For years I’ve known that I’d one day attend the capsule opening ceremony to claim success or admit failure both in public and, far more importantly, to myself.

I’d be a novelist by that day, or I’d be a failure. Period.

And yet, I have not written a novel. The days and years have flitted by and I cannot honestly say I’ve made more than the merest progress.

Oh, I’ve written some things: stage plays, screenplays, poems, blog entries, podcasts, essays, columns, comics, stories, technical manuals, jokes, eulogies, love letters, legal documents, and lots of other lies. But not a novel. Never a novel.

And last week I realized that the time capsule might be due to be opened as early as next year. Or this year.

Or last year.

Tick tick tick.

Part Two

Dinner was served as part of the time capsule’s closing ceremony. At my table was author Timothy Findley and members of the cast of Cats. There may have been other people, too, but I was still shaking off the effects of puberty (often literally) so I mostly just stared at the Cats ladies.

At some point Timothy Findley brought out a stack of his novel Not Wanted On The Voyage to sign for anyone who wanted one. I’d already read one of his books and found it not to my liking, so like the snot-nosed brat I was I declined a copy of the book.

[aside]

Yes, I realize that’s just the sort of action that would come back to bite me on the ass Karma-wise if this was a fictional tale of a would-be novelist.

But even given my presumably nonfictional state, it was a crappy thing for me to do. Old Carrington often shakes his head at the actions of Young Carrington.

Young Carrington would like to interject that he could kick Old Carrington’s pasty non-novel-writing ass.

[end of aside]

Findley didn’t have a pen so he asked if anyone had one he could borrow for the signings. I leant him mine, feeling smugly prepared. Please reread the “snot-nosed brat” comment above.

Eventually we adjourned to the lobby to see the sealed capsule and hear some speeches. Or perhaps that was before dinner. I can’t recall because this was roughly a billion years ago and there were Cats girls to stare at.

I do remember something quite clearly, however. Something that struck me as I was leaving, and that I’ve recalled and recounted ever since. And that something is this:

Timothy Findley stole my pen.

[aside]

That’s not Karma, that’s coincidence. Some other people might call it petty theft, but those would be people less fearful than me of being sued by an author’s estate so I’m going to stick with, um, “premeditated coincidence.”

[end of aside]

So here I am, many years older and no novel richer, ready to head up to the Xerox Tower lobby and look at the date on the capsule’s plaque to see if I’m late. Or early.

Or screwed.

Part Three

Yesterday I trekked up to the Xerox building, camera in hand and lump in throat. Heading up Yonge Street it was easy to spot the salmon tinted tower among the uniformity of apartment buildings and cookie-cutter houses that make up the North York skyline.

I crossed the street and entered the looming pink tower. Can a tower loom? If it contains a date that might doom you to an inevitable and very public failure, then you betcha it can loom.

And loom it bloody well did.

[aside]

Yeah, yeah: giant pink tower equals phallic symbol. We all get it. I was feeling unconfident, worried about creative underachievement, and entering a place that’s held sway over me since puberty. So don’t blame me if I’m a little heavy handed with the symbols of creation, power, and emasculation. It’s not like I’m a professional novelist or anything. Thanks for reminding me. Bastards.

[end of aside]

My first thought as I stepped out of the revolving door was “oh no, the time capsule is gone!” Yes, I thought it with an exclamation point. The lobby looked nothing at all like I’d remembered it, and more importantly there was no big plexiglass shell anywhere to be seen.

I’d been worried about this. What if the time capsule was supposed to be sealed for twenty years? And what if it had been sealed in 1986? Or 1985? That would mean it would have been opened earlier this year, or even (gulp) last year.

The ceremony was over. It happened without me. I’d already missed my deadline. The reason the capsule was on my mind was that subconsciously I’d recalled that this year was the unsealing year.

The capsule was gone.

I was a failure.

Or maybe the capsule was around the corner behind the elevators? Oh, right. There it was. Fwew!

I hadn’t missed the deadline after all. Now all I had to worry about was when that date actually was, and would there be enough time for me to become a published novelist beforehand? Confidently, I looked at the plaque.

And my heart sank…

Part Four

“Not 1986. Please not 1986,” I thought. It was probable that the time capsule was to remain sealed for a “time capsuley” number of years, like 20, 25, or 100. So if it had been sealed in 1986 then there was a chance it was due to be opened in 2006—and there wasn’t much 2006 left.

“Not 1986. Please not 1986,” I repeated for dramatic effect, foreshadowing the inevitable. You’re way ahead of me on this, aren’t you?

I read the first date on the plaque: “SEALED DECEMBER 3, 1986”

Well, pooh.

The twentieth anniversary would be Saturday, December 3. I was reading the plaque on Thursday, December 1.

December 3 minus December 1 equals two days. I had to write and edit a novel, find an agent, find a publisher, and get through the entire publishing and distribution process, all in two days.

This could be a dilemma, logistically speaking.

It’s odd to think I could be distracted at the moment I was reconciling myself to failure, but I was: a blood soaked hand appeared to be floating inside the capsule.

You have to admit that’s pretty good as far as distractions go.

An odd choice of things to preserve. Could I really have been so intent back in 1986 on either Timothy Findley’s pennapping or the Cats gals that I’d missed the part of the ceremony where they’d cut off somebody’s hand?

I leaned up against the capsule, pressing my face against it for a better look. Peering more closely I realized it wasn’t a hand, it was a glove: the red golf glove of U.S. Women’s Open champion Marlene Stewart Streit, now crusty and hard.

[aside]

The glove, that is. Ms. Streit may very well remain crustless and pliable for all I know.

[end of aside]

Other items on display were: Jesse Barfield’s bat; Borje Salming’s hockey stick; December 3, 1986, issues of four newspapers; a platinum record by Sharon, Lois and Bram; a photo of the place where Lester B. Pearson was born in 1897; a box of Trivial Pursuit (huh?); student essays by Julia Basin, Aubrey Kassirer, and yours truly; and 1985 Annual Reports by the North American Life Assurance Company and Xerox Canada Inc.

What kind of boring-ass companies pick their own annual reports as contributions to a time capsule? Welcome to Yawnsville, population you.

And then my eyes were drawn down below the bloody(-seeming) (non-)hand where on a little shelf sat Not Wanted On The Voyage.

“Gimme back my pen, Findley.”

My words came out sounding like “Gimeh buh muh PEH, FIMMY!” because my face was still pressed against the capsule. The capsule was up on a railing/riser, so I had to lean far forward with my legs splayed wide. My hands were planted on either side of the capsule as I hugged it to hold myself upright. The right side of my face was mashed up against the clear plexiglass, my nose smushed to the side.

It’s important for you to have a clear idea what I looked like at that moment, because that’s how I appeared when I glanced up and saw the security guard looking at me from the other side of the capsule.

“Can I help you, sir?” he asked. It may have been the fact that the capsule muffled his words, but to me it sounded a little like “Can I distract you, Mr. Crazy Time Capsule Kissing Man, while my partner levels his tazer at your back?”

I think it was the way he said “sir.”

Part Five

I straightened up and wiped my face-smudge off the capsule while I stammered an explanation to the guard. I blurted out a bit about how the rolled up white paper suspended inside the capsule was my essay. I told him I’d been worried that the time capsule might be opened on its twentieth anniversary. I told him about attending the ceremony back in 1986.

By the time I mentioned the Cats girls I realized I was rambling.

“See, that’s my name,” I said, pointing out the “Carrington Vanston” etched in the plaque as if that settled the matter. I definitely pointed to it in a “no need to tazer me, no siree” sort of way.

He had walked around the capsule while I was babbling, and he looked at the plaque. I steeled myself to explain in more detail about my novelist-or-failure deadline, about this web site, and perhaps even about how Timothy Findley stole my pen but was dead now. I made a mental note not to make that sound like a causal relationship.

Then I realized he wasn’t looking back. He was just standing there staring at the plaque. This went on for some time: me looking at him, him looking at the plaque, me not mentioning Findley.

Finally, he turned back to me and said: “It’s 2005.”

This is not what I was expecting him to say. It didn’t have the words “don’t touch” in it. It didn’t have the words “escorted from the premises” in it. It didn’t even have that ominous “sir” in it. I was confused.

This is a precise transcription of the next exchange between us, word for word as far as I can recall:

Me: “I’msorrywhat?” (said as one word)

Him: “Pardon?”

Me: “I mean, pardon?”

Him: “What?”

Me: “What what? I mean, which what? What did I say, or what did you say?”

Him: “It’s 2005.”

Me: “Oh. Okay.”

[aside]

At this point my mind wandered, as it often does. I was reminded of a favorite gag from high school. I used to rush up to people in malls and ask them what time it was. When they’d look at their watch I’d say “No, the year? What YEAR is it?!?” When they’d tell me the year I’d say something like “So it worked! It WORKED!” and then I’d run away laughing triumphantly. I used to love doing that.

[end of aside]

Him: “It’s 2005, not 2006.”

Oh, right. So it was.

The rest of the exchange with the security guard was standard “please don’t hug and kiss the capsule” stuff that we’ve all heard before, then he left me to it. Strange. I would’ve kept my eye on someone like me.

I’d like to say I had mixed up the year because I’d gotten so caught up in the “twentieth anniversary” idea. But the reality is I often get the year wrong anyway. My cheques still have “19__” on them, which I cross out on the rare times I need to use one and write in some vaguely early 21st Century-ish year. I’m usually not off by more than one or two.

I’d also like to mention that of the scores of you who have written in during this extended blog story only one of you pointed out the errant year. (Here’s a shout-out to sharp-eyed Postmodern Sass, one of my favorite bloggers and a fellow Torontonian.)

So it was 2005 (and for all I know it still is). It had only been 19 years since my essay had been sequestered. The twentieth anniversary wasn’t for a full year and two days.

I had tons of time!

In fact, I had even more time than you might think because I’d already read the true uncorking date on the plaque. I’d read it as soon as I got there, of course, but I thought it would be more fun to string you along a bit on the blog. I’m a meanie.

Below the disappointing 1986 date on the plaque was the all-important second date, the date of my deadline:

“TO BE OPENED DECEMBER 3, 2011.”

I had six years and two days to go! Six long wonderful amazing incredible and most important of all probably sufficient years.

It was the perfect result. Much less and I’d likely have no chance to get a novel written and published in time. Much more and I’d probably slip back into the lazy “oh there’s lots of time” mentality that got me into this mess in the first place.

The giant pink tower didn’t seem nearly so intimidating when I left, but that’s probably because it was cold out.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a novel to write.

You can imagine (because you are bright and have a good imagination, or so you insist) how disappointed I was to discover there were just two sounds available and both were crap.

Space crap, sure, but crap nonetheless.

The first one is called “acoustic during descent” and it’s a cheesy “fire retro-rockets” sound. Basically, it sounds like wind or static or somebody saying “whoosh.” Super.

The second one is called “radar conversion” and it was clearly put there to make me long for the joys of the first one. I won’t be surprised when the ESA finally admits this is a sample from Yars’ Revenge.

I can’t be the only one who thinks it would like distilling the essence of awesome to hear something more tangible recorded on another world. I don’t want low fidelity bleeps and blips, I want something for which I have an on-Earth context. I want a song.

Why oh why didn’t any of the pocket protector wearers at the ESA think of giving the Titan lander a little speaker to play a song and then record what it sounds like on another world? That’d be so much cooler, and more informative, than fuzzy radar blurps.

Imagine being able to hear what Aretha Franklin or Buddy Holly sounds like on another world? Coolest. Thing. Ever.

I suspect the ESA could’ve recouped the cost of the entire mission through pay-per-listen fees by simply including a little flash memory drive full o’ MP3s and presenting the first extra terrestrial concert.

Or how about a web page where you could submit a sound to be relayed to the lander and played on another world? Mind bogglingly cool. I know I’d fork over a spoonful of bucks to be able to pick a song to be played on Titan. Or better yet to be able to send my own voice across an alien landscape.

Best of all, this would set a great precedent. I’d love it if we started doing this every time we planted a lander on another planet or moon, because that means some day when we finally land on some place that’s populated we can really freak out the indigenous people.

It’s one thing for an Earth probe to plunk itself down in the middle of a bunch of Grebulons on Planet X, but it’s a whole ‘nother level of cool to follow that up with a screaming guitar riff.

Or, if I had my way, it’d just start playing jokes at them. Feed them some Bob Hope or Henny Youngman. Do the Grebulons have roads and chickens and their own philosophies of why the latter crosses the former?

I’d love it if the first message we received back from an alien civilization was “How fat is she…?”

Then on that fateful day when UFOs finally float down through Earth’s atmosphere to land on Capital Hill (or more likely the Mall of America), they’ll extend their ramps and out will walk a Grebulon resplendent in its silvery jumpsuit. It will pause dramatically, and then probably open with something like “We have flown across the great expanse of the galaxy to greet you in peace, and boy are our arms tired.”

And we’ll probably shoot him in the head. Because, you know, that’s what we do. I wonder how you say “Fuck ‘em if they can’t take a joke” in Grebulon?

The people who believe these things call them hidden truths. The rest of us call them conspiracy theories. (Or “the latest one from that nutbar in accounting,” depending on whether they’re in the room with us when we’re talking about them.)

There are actually people who believe such theories. We encounter them all the time: some of them post grainy photos of UFOs on their all-lowercase blogs, some of them write books called things like Licorice: The Hidden Confectionary Power Behind 9/11 and/or JFK, and some of them stand in front of you at the grocery store buying a remarkable quantity of tinfoil. Or sprouts. I’m always suspicious of the ones with the sprouts.

But when does it all start? Do these people ease into these things, first believing they share a special bond with their cat and then slowly over the years coming around to the opinion that Mr. Buttons is telling them to climb up a bell tower and start thinning out the neighborhood? Or maybe it’s a sudden thing, like going to bed one evening thinking about tomorrow’s bank loan application and waking up the next morning as the Venusian Ambassador to Planet 3.

I have a theory. I call it the “It’s All Santa’s Fault, That Fat Fucker” theory. I’m still working on the title.

My theory goes something like this: it’s all Santa’s fault, that fat fucker. There’s a little more to it than that, but I wanted to get the basics out of the way quickly in case my computer is being tapped and this transmission gets cut short by Them.

Before I get to the details of the IASFTFF theory, let’s discuss the lie of Santa. We know that Santa does not exist. His supposed feats are provably impossible according to the laws of physics, just as they are provably false by objective observation.

So the facts are these: Santa does not exist, we know this, and yet we tell our children that he does exist. We lie to our kids, just as our parents lied to us. It’s a seasonal, festive falsehood.

Some things are so pervasive that they become invisible. Calling Santa a lie might sound harsh, but that’s only because in our society Santa is a shared concept that runs so deep most of us never bother to think about its effects.

Take the movie Miracle on 34th Street for instance. Reducing it to its essentials, this is a film about a lady who tells her child an unpopular truth and then is vilified for doing so. All the people around her share a secret lie and they persecute her into becoming One Of Us. In the end her resistance is broken and she embraces the lie, seeking comfortable social acceptance at the expense of deceiving her own daughter.

It’s a message movie. Nice family stuff.

This definition of the film might seem extreme, but that’s only because the lie of Santa is part of our culture. It would be different if the movie was not about the Santa but instead about some other lie. What if it was about a small town in which everyone “sees” a dragon that doesn’t actually exist? In this version, the mother might tell her daughter that the dragon isn’t real, much to the chagrin of the town elders who see the dragon as an important tradition and cultural bond.

Imagine the final scene in which the wearied mom finally gives in after weeks of aggressive social pressure, and she tells her own daughter that she sees the dragon.

What would we be expected to feel when her little girl points at thin air and says, “yes, mommy, I can see it, too. I can see the dragon.” Fade out, scroll credits, dry your eyes and think about how lucky we are that we don’t live in a town like that.

Oh, except we do. But since it’s just Santa, we say it’s all harmless fun.

But how harmless is it, really? I think perhaps the lie of Santa is what causes a certain percentage of western society to believe in vast governmental coverups and X-Files plotlines.

You see, it’s no use arguing with these people about the unlikelihood of government conspiracies that require hundreds or even thousands of people to be in on them. It’s no use pointing out the odds against any conspiracy succeeding when it requires complicity by a huge number of people. And the reason it’s no use is because back when they were kids there really was a time when everybody was in on it.

To these people Santa wasn’t just a lie, it was a conspiracy. Mom and dad were in on it. The teachers were in on it. The guy on the evening news was in on it, even going so far as to fabricate radar reports of a flying sleigh. The TV and the radio and the newspapers were all in on it. The people who make movies were in on it. The people who make toys were in on it, deeply. Hell, somebody even arranged for actors to dress up like Santa and then hired them to wait in conspicuous places to reinforce the lie.

Everybody was in on it. Absolutely everybody. Every trusted authority figure, every person lining the street, all the media…everybody. It was a real live worldwide conspiracy that cost billions of marketing dollars, the coordinated efforts of tens of thousands of people, and the complicity of every single person in a position of authority.

So it’s no use telling conspiracy theorists that their ideas about government coverups and alien invasions are ridiculous due to the number of people who’d have to be involved to make them work. The kids might be alright, but they won’t get fooled again.

You say it’s all harmless fun? You say there’s no danger in having a shared conspiracy to lie to our own children? You say nothing bad can come from yanking the rug out from under our wide-eyed, foolishly trusting kids?

Don’t make me ho ho ho.

I link to neither site because I blame them both. But while I won’t link to them, I will add them to the list of nefarious companies that don’t get to have my money. Other list members include censorious bookmonger Chapters-Indigo, notorious spammonger Priceline, and vainglorious crapmonger Wal-Mart.

Oh, and Cher. She knows why.

The Diesel ad was an image of a dead bird oozing its own intestines. This supposedly is a good way to sell jeans:

The dead bird image I could live with. Frankly, many of Diesel’s former campaigns were more offensive than this gutted bird ad. (e.g. the “Big Titted Party Girl Bottle-Blonds Will Fuck You If You Wear Diesel Jeans” campaign from 1999, and last year’s “It’s Cool To Look Uncool, Provided You’re Actually Cool And Just Wearing This Crap Ironically” campaign.)

But just like the label whores themselves who go truffling for currently hip brand names, it wasn’t the image of the ad but rather its nature that offended me.

What grabbed my goat by his good bits was the fact that it was a full-screen animation that floated over the whole window, stalling my browser until a close box slowly wafted into view. In a word, it was ignorant.

This was not a pop-up in the traditional sense. Spamvertisers are finding their pop-ups increasingly ignored due to the prevalence of pop-up blockers and better browsers like Firefox, so the new trend is toward floating content inside the main window itself.

Normally I’m immune to such nonsense because I rarely keep the Flash plug-in enabled, or else I use FireFox’s “Flashblock” extension. Flash is generally used for only three things: invasive advertisements, puerile animations, and invasively puerile animated advertisements.

Alas, today I had Flash enabled when I landed at the Hint site. What ensued can only be described as a browser hijack. A big “bend my browser over the table and say hello prison style” from Warden Diesel and Screw-on-the-take Hint Magazine.

I disabled Flash and returned to the Hint site so I could look over the code for the Diesel ad, with thoughts of perhaps writing a Firefox extension that wipes both Diesel and Hint from the face of the net as far as my own browser is concerned. But without Flash the Hint site was if anything even more useless:

The Javascript code that opens the ad doesn’t first check to see if Flash is available, it just grabs the full screen and leaves it up to my browser to display a big blank “get the plug-in, sucker” link. The Hint site is hidden away underneath, unreachable. That’s awesome web design, kids.

Let’s look at the Hint site’s code and see what it reveals about the mag’s mentality, shall we? Yes, I think we shall. Visiting the site with both Flash and Javascript happily disabled, a quick click on the “view source” menu reveals a site comprised of nonstandard HTML, riddled with Javascript nonsense, and lacking even so much as a doctype declaration.

Clearly, somebody needs a visit from the web standards project. Yes, a nice long visit. With clubs.

Here’s a list of the Javascript functions that appear at the top of the Hint Magazine home page, in order:

1. popUpCentered
2. popUpEmail
3. popUpRegistration
4. popUpProfile
5. popUpSlideShowCollections
6. popUpSlideShowSize
7. popUpSlideShow
8. popUpPoll
9. poppedUpAd
10. popUpFlash
11. popUpFlashnew

See a pattern there at all? Take your time, it’s subtle. I’ll give you a hint: look for the word popUp.

Shame on you, Diesel, for creating such an ad. Shame on you, Hint Magazine, for enabling it. You’ve both made The List. I wish your companies bankruptcy, your customers an increased awareness of your manipulative shallowness, and your board members syphilis. In whatever order is most uncomfortable.

Yes, this was Saturday night. Yes, I did turn down an invite to go out dancing with friends in favor of sitting home typing on a twenty year old computer. Yes, I understand how much of a nerd I am. Sigh.

Where was I? Oh right: the Apple IIe.

I don’t have much by way of software for the Apple IIe yet, so I did what we all used to do two decades ago when when faced with a lack of software: I wrote some. The IIe has a version of BASIC built-in so I used that to slap together a quick program that made a little man run along the bottom of the screen and get hit by a falling anvil.

Admittedly this isn’t the most useful program in the world, but it gave me a chance to bang away on the keyboard for a while. The keyboard is actually the point of this article, but I haven’t gotten to the point yet. I tend to ramble. You have probably noticed this. In fact by now you’ve probably skipped down to the italic bit that says “which finally brings me to the point of this article.” Well, I assume it’s in italics and says something like that, but I can’t be sure because I haven’t gotten to the point at which I’ll get to the point, if you see what I mean.

Where was I? Oh, right: programming.

What I really wanted to do was play something like an Infocom text adventure game. So I saved the code for Anvil Smoosh version 1.0, typed “new” (it took me forever to remember how to clear out the BASIC code, silly me), and started working on an interactive fiction game.

I was making it up as I went, entering bits of code stream of consciousness style and not worrying about the specifics of either the map or the objects in the game. It was a very fun way to spend a Saturday night—I mentioned I knew the nerdliness of that, right? Just checking. I’m going to finish up the game, but probably switch to developing it in one of the dedicated interactive fiction development languages like Inform or Tads so I stop reinventing the wheel. Actually, a more appropriate metaphor would be “so I stop having to figure out how many wheels I need and where to put them, and I can get on with describing the road trip” but that’s not as catchy.

Where was I? Oh right: the keyboard.

And that finally brings me to the point of this article. No italics, so there—ha ha, too bad for you, skimmers! No help for you! … Sorry, just a bit of an in-joke for those who have been with me on this long rambling journey to the point at which I can point out the point. For those who jumped ahead, you could always scroll up and see what you missed, but don’t expect us to wait for you. It’s a little late to be asking us for favors, don’t you think, Mr. or Ms. I’m Too Busy To Read The Whole Article?

Where was I? Oh right: the point.

The point of this article (oh, pooh) is that I couldn’t believe how fast I could type on that keyboard. Every year, computer makers strive to make quieter and quieter keyboards. The days of CLACK CLACK CLACK are long gone. I can only assume the sound of all that loud typing was distracting mangers in the next room from concentrating on their games of computer solitaire. Alternatively, perhaps the lack of the clacks had been cluing managers into the fact that the people in the next room were just playing solitaire, too. I’m not sure. All I do know is, for whatever motivation, keyboards keep getting quieter.

And how are they getting quieter? By becoming mushier. Sure, they’re silent. They’re all kinds of silent. I’m thwacking away on my PowerBook’s keyboard right now and the only noise it makes when I strike a key is a muffled thump. (Note to self: add “muffled thump” when anvil strikes little man in version 1.1.)

But the tactile feeling of keyboards has been reduced year upon year. I notice this each time I get a new computer. But it’s easy to become acclimatized to a new keyboard, so after a day or two of using a new keyboard I’m off and typing without complaint. Except I suppose this whole article is a complaint. Okay, I’m off and typing with rarely a complaint outside of the occasional huffy complaint I post online.

Where was I? Oh, right: tactile feeling.

A couple decade’s worth of small moves toward mushiness has resulted in one big bowl of mush. I really noticed the difference when I jumped back twenty years in one night to type on that Apple IIe.

Sure, the Apple IIe is an ergonomic nightmare. The keyboard is raised about 4 inches high so my wrists were at a terrific angle. Sitting at my kitchen table, it was quickly apparent this would not be a setup I could use for many hours on end without strain. But it was just as quickly apparent I was typing as fast and then faster than I had in many years.

I think part of it was the fact that the keys are more spread out on that keyboard. They’re spaced about the same as my fingers are when I let my hand hang loose. My PowerBook’s so-called “full sized keyboard” forces my fingers closer together. I thought a smaller keyboard would result in faster typing since my fingers travel a shorter distance, but the reality is wider key spacing results in larger “targets” and thus faster typing.

I actually did a quick typing test, grabbing a nearby novel and selecting a chapter at random to transcribe on both computers. The novel was Triplanetary by E. E. “Doc” Smith. It’s the first in the classic Lensman books, and it’s a pip. If you’re into sci-fi (or speculative fiction, or sf, or whatever the hell the more hip nerds are calling it these days) you really should read the entire Lensman series as it’s arguably the greatest space opera ever told. All six books in the series are must-reads for fans of, um…scientificition.

Where was I? Oh, right: the typing test.

I transcribed the passage notably faster on the Apple II than on my PowerBook. I was just typing text: no formatting menus to select nor any strange muscle-memory key combination chords to play. I typed two chapters. Each computer got it’s chance to go second in case familiarity with the text sped things up. In both cases, I was measurably faster on the Apple IIe’s keyboard. By “measurably” I mean “I quickly glanced at a distant clock before and after typing.” This was all very scientific.

So I have very scientifically proven that I type faster on one Apple computer that was 172 times cheaper and supposedly runs 1,250 times slower than another Apple computer. That must be what Apple means by “the megahertz myth.”

Now, I’m not about to return to a world devoid of multiple gigabyte hard drives, sub-5-pound notebooks, bright color screens, wireless high speed internet access, and all the porn—I mean music—I mean news I can download. I’m nostalgic, not stupid. But I am going to investigate my mechanical switch keyboard options, with an eye out for ones which shunt that useless caps lock key to a remote corner where it belongs.

And the CLACK! Oh, I like the CLACK. The CLACK is very satisfying. There’s nothing that says “Hey look at you! You’re getting stuff done!” like that CLACK. My PowerBook’s spongy keyboard doesn’t say anything so encouraging. Thump thump thump, it mumbles, which I take to mean “one must assume you are going to edit this article later, musn’t one?” The snobbish little dear. My Apple IIe is much more encouraging. “Go, Carrington, go!” it says with its CLACKs. “I’m with you all the way. You’re doing great. Keep it up. Thanks for not letting me end up in the garbage.”

My PowerBook clearly doesn’t have enough fear of my passing fancies. Perhaps I should bring up a chart showing the rapidity of computer obsolescence and maybe set my desktop image to a photo of a computer landfill to see if I can get its attention.

Ah, is that a little clack I hear?

As with every other store on this big round Earth, Sunrise has a frequent buyer card. Ostensibly such cards are meant to reward loyal customers, though a more cynical person than I might suggest they are a means of buying such loyalty.

Unlike most loyalty cards, however, the Sunrise card is one you purchase. The membership fee is small, and the resulting “member discount price” on merchandise would quickly recoup the membership fee for someone who buys DVDs with reckless abandon the way I do.

Except that I hadn’t bothered to buy the card. The reason was loyalty cards are wallet bulking annoyances that I prefer to leave at home.

However, I bought a sizable stack of DVDs all at once one day and the helpful cash register professional pointed out that buying the card first would actually result in a net savings for this one purchase.

So as I walked home feeling a bit guilty about the non-recyclable bags that held my new armfuls of filmly goodness, my wallet was thicker by the size of one more rewards card.

When I got home I tossed the card on a pile of its peers, where it has remained to this day. I can see it there poking out from under a local burger joint’s stamp card with its single fading stamp.

I am now a card owning, if not card carrying, paid member of the Most Loyal True Blue Sunrise Records Customer Group, or words to that effect. I will now receive special discounted prices on all my future DVD purchases, and presumably on CDs as well. This looks like the start of a beautiful friendship for Sunrise and me.

Except it isn’t. I haven’t shopped there since getting the card. Not once. Oh, I’ve gone in. I’ve even picked out DVDs I wanted to buy. But never once since paying my way into membership have I actually made a purchase in the store. And it’s because of that card.

You see, I don’t carry the card around with me. It’s just one of the masses of membership cards that sit on my desk at home because I dislike stuffing my wallet with them. I dislike carrying an extra inch of bulk in my pants—which, by the way, makes me absolutely not the target market for 90% of the spam I receive.

Since I don’t carry the card, I no longer shop at Sunrise. Before I had a membership, I simply ignored the membership prices. I was already a loyal Sunrise customer—a regular, repeat customer—and one that was all the more valuable to the store because I paid full price.

But now that I have a card, the membership prices represent not a savings but a loss when I shop there. Those discounts now seem like punishments for leaving the card at home. They’re now the extra fee Sunrise is charging me for not carrying around their damn card.

So I have started going across the street to make my purchases in a shop that doesn’t reward frequent buyers. I no longer even go into Sunrise, and will probably keep away until my membership expires because the sight of all those “This is how much more you have to pay, Carrington, you big sucker” price stickers are just depressing.

[aside]

Yes, they really do say that. The words “you” and “sucker” are even in boldface, which, I’m not ashamed to say, hurts.

[end of aside]

Some membership cards work for me. I don’t like them, but the system is effective. Stamp cards, for instance, work if I can redeem multiple cards. “A free sandwich with 10 stamps, you say? Great! Here are my ten stamps…on ten different cards.”

The big question is this: why the hell aren’t any stores smart enough to do away with the damn cards and switch to rewarding their actual customers instead? Let us have pass phrases or pin numbers.

Or a secret handshake! Something that cool would seal my purchasing loyalty forever, and I bet I’m not alone.

But if they insist on a card system then at least let me pick my own card. Let me swipe any damn card I please, then have your software hash it and index my account accordingly. We customers are all sure to have something suitable on us, perhaps a driver’s license or a library card or a Blue Blazer Regulars identification card. Give me convenience and you’ll get my loyalty. Plus you’ll save the cost of printing your own cards.

On the other hand—and I realize I’m probably talking nonsense now—if we’re such frequent and appreciated customers why don’t you just recognize us and give us the damn frequent buyer discount? You might have kept my business that way.

I’ll be across the street shopping at your competition while you think it over.

By “record,” of course, you just mean “personal best.” You don’t mean “record” in the sense of an actual record or anything wacky like that. Apple’s latest numbers, for instance, show that it’s selling songs at over three times that rate (and at twice the cost). But you dropped your prices so you were losing money on each sale, and you achieved your own personal highest sales (and, I presume, highest loss) ever.

You lost money on each sale, but you tried valiantly to make up in volume. You did your best, and for that I applaud you.

When you, my sweet, claim that “music fans who want choice are turning to Real,” that is not a lie either. It is clear that by “choice” you aren’t talking about amount of music available; after all, you offer far fewer songs than are available on rival services, and only a small fraction of the songs available from shops in the big scary Real World.

You also, dear heart, state that you “are the only place consumers can buy music and enjoy it on any popular portable device.”

That is not a lie. You simply are not counting regular old MP3s or any other format that isn’t hobbled by an asinine, restrictive Digital Rights Management scheme. Oh, and you were pressed for time and just didn’t get around to mentioning that I can burn any songs I buy from the iTunes music store and import them with no DRM restrictions at all. You weren’t lying, you just have poor time management.

Please note, my lovely, that I’m not endorsing Apple’s DRM over yours. All DRM is equally insulting and we should fight it tooth and nail. And crowbar. But that means I don’t endorse your highly restrictive DRM-shackled music files either.

And I realize, my pet, that when you claim to be the “only place” to buy music compatible with any portable player you were only considering rival online music file resellers. I’m sure it’s an honest mistake, not a lie, that you have forgotten to include the many thousands of local music stores plus the huge number of small and large online retailers who sell a quaint old product called a compact disc.

Those are also called CDs, in case you’re unfamiliar with the term.

To bring you up to speed with the cool kids, a CD is a music file distribution format that offers far higher quality sampling than available from online stores like the iTunes music store and your own “digital discount bin” establishment. Music on these CDs has no Digital Rights Management in place to interfere with fair and reasonable use of the music, including placing copies on absolutely any portable music player ranging from the iPod to the oldest cassette walkman to something amazing that hasn’t even been invented yet.

You know, given all the many advantages a CD has over online music files, I’m starting to think these CD things could really take off.

And so, my pooky-bear, I want to conclude this billet-doux with a little advice. It’s unbecoming of you to so loudly proclaim the values of choice and purchaser freedom when you do not have, let’s be honest, a great track record when it comes to such things yourself. Must I bring up the hidden and deceptive links to the free version of your Real Player software?

Now now, before you object and embarrass us both, let me just say that any true champion of consumer choice would not have struggled to invent something like Harmoney to shoe-horn her own DRM-restricted files onto other people’s iPods. Instead, a champion of choice would have simply sold DRM-free music or posted a page with instructions on how to strip away the DRM and free the music.

Hmmm, “free the music.” That has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?