From The Morgue

There was a documentary here the other night about Tetris. I didn’t watch it. I was scared I’d get the urge again.
Tetris was one of the best of what I call the ‘pattern games’. Solitaire, Freecell, Minesweeper – all the same. They consist of a procedure of pattern manipulation that is highly repetitive and simple combined with a large variety of possible patterns. They are utterly engrossing, and I think that’s because they take work in perfect step with the brain itself.
My university training was in psychology, principally cognitive functioning such as memory. I was, and remain, fascinated by non-conscious processing – basically, where the neural system in your brain busily tracks or recognises or prompts something without your conscious awareness of what it’s doing.
The other day I started singing ‘there were green alligators…’ out of the blue, wondered what came next and eventually realised it was that song about noah’s ark leaving the unicorn behind. Then I did a double-take, for right next to me was a picture of a unicorn. My brain was processing stuff and spitting it out, and I wasn’t at all aware.
Brains are good with patterns. In a sense, patterns is all they are and all they do. Our brains are extremely good at noticing patterns and structuring our behaviour accordingly, much better than we usually realise. Our brains don’t tell our conscious awareness what they’ve noticed or figured out though – we just act accordingly. Even if we reflect on our actions, there’s usually no hints that some of our behaviour was prompted by recognising a pattern. Fortunately our conscious selves are very good at coming up with reasonable-sounding explanations for everything we do, so it isn’t much of a problem.
Tetris and the other pattern games exploit this. Our conscious effort is united with our non-conscious function to recognise and manipulate a pattern. Combined, they can provide an incredibly involving experience.
I remember when I was playing a lot of Tetris – I’d throw on a CD and listen to it while the blocks came tumbling down. My mind would wander incredibly, in and out of the music and the game-playing experience in front of me. It’s the closest to dreaming I’ve ever been while awake. And, not surprisingly, when I put my head down to sleep I would still have one foot in Tetris – the patterns would continue in my head, blocks coming down not as if I was seeing them but as if I could feel my brain playing out the patterns over and over and over again.
Which it was.
I didn’t watch the documentary but I did read the Guardian’s article about it. It mentioned a woman who spent a day seeing people talking in Tetris, their words falling from their mouths in patterns like blocks. This is how the brain works. It’s a crazy thing to put a mind in, I reckon – not that we have a choice in the matter.
—
Because I know you’ve all been aching for it, that rpg.net thread is here.
And handsome tall man Chuck, and my own handsome fizzog, are temporarily visible at Cal’s blog.
EDIT: and the book we are holding up is, spookily, pattern recognition. That’s the unicorn factor at work again, perhaps?

Waitangi Day – New Zealand’s national day. There’s a lot I could say about this but I will again resist temptation (aided of course by my desire to go to sleep).
Instead I will highlight two quotes from two different folk involved in the tumult of Waitangi Day 2004:
“Mud throwing is not the way for New Zealand to advance to the future.”
– Don Brash, after being splattered with mud
(from here)
“Go up and find out for yourself.”
– tree-climbing protester when asked by a reporter what it was like up the
tree
(from here)
Non-Kiwis won’t get enough context to get more than mild amusement at the state of our politics. Locals, though, might appreciate the richness of how these two quotes symbolise the issues. At least they do for me. Maybe I’m just reading too much in.
Amusing, anyway, alongside the seriousness of it all. Yes, it can be both at once. Politics usually is.
—
Went to see ‘Taking Sides’ tonight at Kings Theatre. Julian Glover. Just felt the need for some stage-stuff, and the queue for the free preview of Death of a Salesman was ten million people long.
It was… okay. I dunno why I didn’t warm to it more, given how it touched on many themes dear to my heart in ways I thought were clever and even wise – , maybe it was because it was built around a conundrum which I resolved to my satisfaction a decade ago.
Certainly the sheer theatricality of the production startled me. Actors booming their lines out into the audience, exaggerating their gestures, dialogue that sound like Highly Charged Aphorisms strung together. I’ve gotten so used to naturalism that I couldn’t get past it in this show. Although it could just have been that the show itself was badly written and directed.
Nah.
Anyway, much cheaper stuff at the festival was much better. Of course.
—-
I’ve just web-published a long-term project. It’s a roleplaying game ruleset, and I’m quite proud of it. However, if you’re not interested in the nuts-and-bolts side of RPGs then don’t bother following this link for more info.

I received a letter from my grandmother yesterday. Brilliant. Letters are great, and letters from beloved grandmothers are one of the best kinds.
I know you read this blog sometimes Felice – you’ll be getting a reply in kind.
—
We had a big fryup for dinner. Mushrooms and scrambled eggs and tofu sausages. Man, that tofu was the blandest I have ever et. I think I have been spoiled forever by the wondrous Engine Shed smoked tofu (thanks Brad).
Still: yum.
—
I finally finished the writeup of the roleplaying game I ran late last year, Providence Summer, on RPG.net. It’s about kids and teens in Providence, RI in the summer of ’61. They hang out, fight, make out, and get into trouble. It was really something quite special. One part Rebel Without A Cause, one part Stand By Me, one part Twin Peaks without the creepy supernatural stuff. One hell of a tale with an ending that’ll stay with me for the rest of my life. Groove.
And the whole point of this bit was that I was gonna link to the writeup now, but rpg.net is down. Ah well.
—
WMD intelligence inquiries. I have a whole rant but I’ll spare you this time – it’s past midnight and I need some sleep.
Good night.

The infamous aura of burning surrounding Edinburgh resident Morgan Davie struck again on Friday. At approximately 4.45pm, Mr Davie’s work PC began to “sound like it was clicking its tongue”. Shortly after, the computer desktop stopped working.
Mr Davie was then shown the error-page known among computer experts as “the blue screen of death”.
Upon investigation, it transpired that Mr Davie’s hard drive had burned out. Scorch marks were visible on the hard drive unit. Crucially, all data stored on the hard drive was lost.
This is an unusual fault in year-old components from reputable manufacturer Dell Computers. However, Mr Davie believes the Dell components were not faulty. “I’ve got this aura of burning. Hard drives always burn out on me. They just do. It’s really annoying, actually.”
Mr Davie has had three hard drives burn out on him in the past, a rate of burnout that is “significantly above the average”.
A Dell Computers spokesman had this to say: “That guy’s just got a freaky aura of burning. What ya gonna do?”
– Reuters

Been meaning to post this link for a while. It’s an interesting take on NZ by an associate (and sometimes fellow blogger) of Tom Tomorrow, Salon’s left-leaning political cartoonist.
I liked it. We likes hearing people talk about our country, yes we do, yes we do, gollum gollum.
~`morgue

I pick that the stupid Academy will do this:
ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
Sean Penn – MYSTIC RIVER
(possible surprise: Johnny Depp – PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: THE CURSE OF THE BLACK PEARL. Yes, seriously.)
ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Benicio Del Toro – 21 GRAMS
ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
50/50 between Keisha Castle-Hughes – WHALE RIDER and
Charlize Theron – MONSTER – as a Kiwi I’m backing Keisha. The Anna Paquin factor, y’know.
ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Renee Zellweger – COLD MOUNTAIN

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
FINDING NEMO

ART DIRECTION
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

CINEMATOGRAPHY
MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD (anything with water gets bonus points)

COSTUME DESIGN
GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING

DIRECTING
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING
(FINally)

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT
FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
SHORT FILM (ANIMATED)
SHORT FILM (LIVE ACTION)
Don’t know any of the nominees

FILM EDITING
CITY OF GOD (and it’d deserve it, too)

MAKEUP
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

MUSIC (SCORE)
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

MUSIC (SONG)
“Into the West” – THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

BEST PICTURE
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

SOUND
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

SOUND EDITING
MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD

VISUAL EFFECTS
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

WRITING (ADAPTED SCREENPLAY)
AMERICAN SPLENDOR
(but it should go to THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING fer chrissakes! it’s the infamous unfilmable book! it’s been made into a great film! grrrrr)

WRITING (ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY)
LOST IN TRANSLATION

Back in my teens I used to get killer migraines. They’d start off by messing up my vision, just removing parts of the scene in front of me. (This never left a big hole – it was a seamless removal, like a t-shirt image being obscured in folds. Incredibly weird sensation. I vividly remember having a conversation with a classmate when I was about 14 and explaining that I knew I was going to have a migraine because I couldn’t see him, even though I was looking straight at him.)
Then you get the big spirally halos, like when you stare at a bulb and get the afterimage, only the afterimage is a thin strip of metal dipped in oil reflecting rainbows at you. And the halo would get bigger, and bigger, and bigger, until it disappeared off the edges of my vision.
And then, about half an hour after that, the migraine would kick in proper and if I wasn’t in a place where I could lie down, it was too damn late. Migraine is nasty. You get the headache mixed in with intense nausea and hypersensitive physicality. Brain is firing all kinds of nonsense, head is aching, stomach feels like it’s in the wrong way. This for about four hours, then another four of decreasing intensity, and then another 48 of gingerly moving through the world with little aftershocks making you watch your step.
Bleah. Anyway, I grew out of them when I left my teens. I had one in 2000, out of nowhere, but apart from that, none since about 94 or so.
Except I had one back at the end of August (the night of the Spearhead gig, curse it) and another one this Friday gone. Two inside of six months after only one in the previous decade… I don’t know what to make of this, exactly. It ain’t a trend I’m encouraging. Hmm.
Anyway, I was in a weird space all that day. I kept having incredibly intense deja vu and presque vu. All the vus. It had got to the point where I had started composing a blog entry beginning “I’ve been spending all day dangling just out of reach of an incredibly vivid but imperceptible other reality.” Or somesuch. That was the idea, though – that it felt like there was another me in another life and I was having crossover. I could never quite grasp the specifics, but I felt over and over again that something was *there*, just out of my mental grasp.
Anyway, then I had the migraine. You can put your cause and effect whichever way you like there.
The migraine was accompanied, when sleep eventually came, by remarkable dreams literally filled with people from my childhood and youth – I remember a group of five polynesian guys I haven’t seen since I was about 12 or 13 and having a big conversation with them. I don’t remember who they were now I’m awake, I don’t remember even if they were real, but I believe they were. One thing the brain is remarkably good at, after all, is remembering faces. Anyway, those five and dozens and dozens more. If you were at my primary school there was an even chance you would have turned up. The only other moment I remember with great clarity was when I dreamed Nikki Schollum (“smile and say hi” type-acquaintance since primary school, some readers I’m sure will know her) being completely unable to remember the name of the big country next to New Zealand. (It’s Australia, honey. You’re welcome.) (Actually, I don’t think I was in the dream at that stage. But if I had been there, I’m pretty sure I coulda told her.)
Anyway. Out of it all now. But migraines are weird things and they mess up your head something wild. Neurons firing all over the show. Wild. And, lest it not be clear, not fun at all.
(Oh – It’s going around, it seems.)
—-
The delightful Craig Duncan was in town this past weekend, not long after his New Years Day nuptials to longtime boyfriend Marcel Hodel – longtime receivers of my morgueatlarge travel emails will remember the photo of those two from back in December, no doubt. I thought it was a great photo. Wonderful to see the old boy.
—-
I’ve realised I’ve got more to say about Lost In Translation, but I’m not going to say it now. Time to go home.
Oh, yeah, my new shoes are T-Mac 3 (since the demise of my beloved Converse to Nike, I’m investigating the exciting land of Adidas). To all (Jon Ball) of y’all (Jon Ball) who are interested (Jon Ball), they are the cool ones with my usual black-with-blue preferred coloration. And you can watch a movie about them over here.
Peace. I windmill whenever I want, apparently.

(which is a Twin Peaks reference, if anyone’s keeping track.)
I rushed out and bought new shoes last night, shoes fer exercisin’ in. I’ve had none since I left New Zealand, which should give you an idea of my current level of fitness – still the same skinny, only now I get tired easily instead of having pretty decent stamina.
Anyway, I’d let myself fall into that trap of not getting the kit because not involved in anything, and not involved in anything because not got the kit. Silly. My sport of choice, basketball, is pretty hidden up here, and I just haven’t seen much else to get enthused about.
Then my boss said ‘come play basketball tomorrow lunchtime’ and i said ‘woohoo’ and now I have new shoes on my feet and a pleasant exercised-tingle in my legs. Lets hope I keep finding avenues in which to play. I’ve got the shoes now, anyway.
—
The shoes are Adidas. I’ve been a Converse boy for years and years, but Converse were bought out by Nike I believe, anyway their shoes are nowhere to be found. So I went with Adidas. They work. I did buy some extra foam inners at the salesguy’s suggestion, and can’t work out how much the decision was mine and how much it was me being suggestive-sold – definitely a combination, but I don’t know the proportions at all. Six quid for foam inners? Crikey! They are extra comfy though, and I rationalise to myself that they’ll make injuries less likely, which is important when coming off a period of no exercise, and… I think I got suggestive-sold. Damn. Am I too lazy to go for the no-questions-asked money-back guarantee? Probably. We’ll find out!!!
—
A bulletin board I frequent was recently attacked by internet trolls, who (I discovered today) were mocking us on their own bulletin board elsewhere. I had the dubious distinction of being quoted and called a schmuck and a dope. Hmm, I haven’t been called names behind my back since primary school, which is about the level on which the trolls are acting.
The experience is kind of meh really. I’m not even remotely angry, but I’m certainly not amused either. It is indisputable that the people involved were being dicks, of course – deliberately trolling a foreign bulletin board for cheap laughs is one of the cardinal sins on the net. Still, I can’t quite seem to laugh it off. Instead I find myself wondering what is going through these peoples’ heads, and whether this kind of behaviour will always be present in the new realm of the ‘net, where concealed identity and the limitation of communication to text only are the default situation and human tribalism rears it head the same ways as usual.
Hey, wow – I just realised that I haven’t forgiven them! Stupid trolls. Do they deserve forgiveness? Hmm.
(For the less net-literate, trolls are folk who post contentious/stupid comments in order to heat up an argument. They win their game when people respond. Yes, it isn’t a very complicated game.)
~`morgue

I have a new phone. It is small and therefore finicky. When I use it I feel like my hands are too big for the job, like I’m King Kong trying to undo the clasps on Fay Wray’s brassiere, only sorta less dirty and hairy. Hmm, maybe that’s a bad metaphor.
—
Cal and I saw Lost in Translation last week. One thing I’m kinda struck by, on reading the coverage and reviews, is how no-one seems to be talking about what’s abundantly obvious to me – Sofia Coppola has based the entire movie on one of her early-teen fantasies. The whole setup is straight out of an intimacy fantasy typical of a daydreaming twelve-year-old girl: the young, pure girl-woman given the opportunity by contrived circumstances to interact with an older, famous movie star who is himself looking for a deep emotional connection, and they spend lots of time together, clearly fall for each other, but do not act on their feelings because they cannot escape their respective cages (and also so the fantasy remains, essentially, pure). It’s the kind of chaste romance a 12 year old girl would imagine for herself.
I don’t think it’s a stretch to read the limbo of jetlag Tokyo as symbolic of the cusp between childhood and adult, where one becomes aware of a new kind of intimate connection between self and other and imagines what it must be like without including sexuality.
After all, Sofia Coppola spent her whole life on film sets, staying in hotels and meeting famous actors. Her films have revealed her to be exactly the kind of imaginative and sensitive person who would write long diary entries filled with yearning for something not entirely understood. I think it’s extremely unlikely she never had the kind of fantasy this film is a development of.
Of course, she’s smart enough as an adult to ground the film without destroying the character of its fantasy. Bill Murray’s character sleeping with the chanteuse is a perfect example – an awareness that the fantasy character is not fully real, and in reality such a person would have a surplus of energy that had to go *somewhere*.
The final stroke of genius, of course, was the final interaction between the two. Sofia Coppola has put a private (if not unusual or uncommon) fantasy into the public domain, but kept the keystone to herself.
I really liked this movie, by the way.

Sometimes I would catch the bus to work. There was a little old man who would catch it too. He would be on the bus, upstairs, without fail.
Recently Cal and I moved. On a completely different bus route, I catch the bus to work.
The little old man is on these buses too. It is the same man.
What is he up to? I am afraid to speak to him.
NOTE: he walks very quickly, for a little old man.