Violent video games Videodrome their way into the real world (sort of)

What a neat idea! (scroll down for pictures and video)

In particular, I like the thought that there may be gifts inside. Sometimes a power-up, sometimes an extra life, and maybe — just maybe — coins. It’s mischievous and generous, and my favorite: imaginative.

But there are hidden dangers when igniting the imagination. Lesson learned? If you’re thinking of putting a bomb in a bright yellow box with an ominous question mark painted upon it, rest assured that your scheme, however it is camouflaged, will be detected by some extremely clever passer-by, and you will be arrested.

Game over.

Spam darkly: the new writing game!

I never thought I’d see the day when I said, “I like spam.” Either the compressed meat or the e-mail kind. But today is that day.

Anybody notice a significant change in Spam 2.0? No longer do I get Nigerian business opportunities or chicks who are “so lonely!” In fact, the exclamation marks are all but extinct. I’m now dealt the innocuous: “Re: your tickets”, or “Your account,” or simply “[none].” Whispers from the subject line yawningly promise dull quotidian maintenance ensconced within. How thoroughly boring. Are those the new findings on what people deign to click on? If so, it may be time to give another species a chance to do great things on Earth.

However, there is hope. The results of a random number generator and basic linguistic construction offer spam haters like me to at least take a second look before pressing delete. Like random tarot cards or a cybernetic form of bibliomancy, Spam 2.0 subject lines offer moments of zen-like insight. Possibly even inspiration:

Klutz operator.
King of Pharrmacy (I really enjoyed that double-r slur)
Banana dispassionately.
Ashen jet lag.
John Broadly.
Sandblast concession.

I almost want to save my spam, with its brilliant names (Nora Grace, Montagu Singleton) and neuron-kinking subjects, to use as a pick-me-up during a day of idea drought.

Almost.

I’m tempted to run with spam inspiration the way this person did. But for now, I’ll be pressing the delete key. I’ll hold out until Spam 3.0 is released — from the white paper, bayesian profiling will give it the power to title itself after the embarrassing moments in your past you never wanted anyone to find out about.

I can’t wait! Nor can I resist:

ashen jet lag
creates this klutz operator
drowsy, absent and hallucinating
a banana, dispassionately.

Word salad train wreck

As an exercise in honesty and shame, I offer an example of a word salad gone wrong. If you can bear reading it, notice how I snap out of it, bitch at myself, then try again with riffs on the word “life”—ultimately abandoning the session.

It served to clear my throat, maybe, but not much else. The danger of word salads is my embrace of sloppy, listless thought (disengagement?), which this one shows quite nicely.

I have no idea what my mind did wrong here. I just couldn’t catch a wave.

Philadelphian flags roared above the shouts of firemen. Unknown licks of flame tickled their extremities, sending shudder pens vaulting towards the stars. Lefty picked a nose pimple, walking upwards upon the air. Superhero? Hardly. Techno-bust? Maybe. Though the story cannot tell you where it came from; you’ll figure that on your own as scrollbars get your click.

Acidic lunch hasn’t strutted mint enough to show him how land (as in farm, not airplane) made down. Clearly, amethyst won’t purplate you if you keep it from the sun. This is the Mars conundrum. Is it sand, or is it burnt sienna? In reality, it matters less than the shadow turquoise. Turquoise can be blue, green, or under a shade of red that produces orange. But it is still turquoise.

Which is why monkeys don’t pick their anuses on sundown. Scent stays well in the heat, just as pain grows acute in the cold. Not! I, or rather he, am upset with Easter. She never liked it. So we found something better to do than hand out eggs. Which I thought was a great decision on your part.

Did that cover it? All forgot everyone. But that’s absolutist, extreme, without the pan pan under-shazamm that is so indicative of spatula wielding.

Ah. This tires. Perhaps because—I hate “perhaps.” I use that bastard word so fucking often I want to pluck its vocal chords out.

And what is this “under-”? A prefix suited for the mystic, or the hypnotist? If so, then what of “Banana”, or all the “B” words? There’s an algorithm for that, ‘cept Reimann isn’t around to draw it on paper, so we’ll never know.

Yesteryear, or Eonyear, what became of you? Life, live, livid, livery. Liver. Is that what we are, the living? Livers? And those of us who avoid direction, preferring the world to guide us into slots that steer our flow, aren’t we half-lifes, Chopped Livers?

Mapping out happiness

While researching mind mapping and concept mapping, I came across this beautiful image drawn by an artist reflecting upon happiness:

More example mindmaps are here. I realized that after time, I began contemplating some of them like mandalas (particularly Scamper) .