Chindie

Well, he's composed, good on the ball, good tackler, a leader on the pitch, scores some cracking goals. The stats speak for themselves - without him we're relegation form with him we're mid-table. Another fight? It's a discussion, that's what normally happens on forums. Fair enough. The fight stuff is a turn of phrase. I mean the discussion is pointless, and also not one I'm particularly interested in debating with you, so lets leave it.

I could equally ask you what your belief he's better than average is based on, that he would walk into most sides - ultimately it's our opinions, isn't it? I don't think I'm saying anything particularly outrageous. Perhaps you disagree. Either way I'm not likely to change my mind and neither are you, so lets fight another fight, yes?

I disagree. In my eyes he is exactly that, average. He does no more than I'd expect of a competent CB at this level. But you're welcome to disagree. As CED says above, he stands out as average because most of the rest of the team is shit.

It remains a worry that our defence goes completely to pieces when a completely average Premier League defender is out. Which occurs a little too much.

Yep. It's those bastard fans that are at fault again Well we sure as hell don't help. I'd be willing to bet good money that the fans come so far down a list of a players demands and needs when considering a transfer that they are irrelevant, I'd go so far as to say they don't feature at all. Which makes this a rather poor pop at thousands of people who pay obscene money week on week to watch their team serve up painfully poor performances, a situation that has gone on too long. If we were prepared to pay for Steven Defour, and we were prepared to pay what he wanted, and no-one more attractive showed any interest (by which I mean more successful, 'bigger', more glamourous in essence) we would, right now, probably have him in our services, even with our supposedly shitty atmosphere and boo-boy fans. The fact of the matter is we aren't prepared for any of that, so we won't. Nothing to do with the fans.

Nonsense. Anywho, I think we'll buy Defour right after we sign prime Ronaldo using the time machine Faulkner made over Christmas.

You say that but the videos above look a lot of fun! The game is anything but a lot of fun, imo. The entire thing revolves around MMO style missions - go here, kill 10 Xs, come back. Given that the AI is rubbish and the shoot mechanics nothing more than serviceable, this becomes really bloody boring really bloody quick. The only hook to grab you is the loot aspect, but that isn't terribly gripping either, as in general there aren't many designs and there aren't that many effects either, so ultimately you're going around collecting higher numbers next to the guns. It's a bit like finding the same old steel sword in some random Skyrim dungeon, but it's got a lightning enchantment this time, and being excited about it. As said, it's a spectacularly tedious game, one note and one paced with nothing to grab you to progress. I can just about see why it might be fun in co-op, but that's not a saving grace for me.

It's hopelessly tedious rubbish.

It's a fascinating conflict, but the fascination lies in the things that also make it less accessible than the Second World War. The Great War was a war of empires, empires all spoiling for a fight and waiting for someone to spill someones drink to kick it all off. There was no 'Great Evil' to rally against, it was a war of pure self interest, and a war that was quite one note - trench warfare is attrition at it's most basic, and that dominated the conflict. Whereas in WW2 you have a degree of a 'righteous' conflict, there was a great evil to vanquish (generally - obviously things are more complicated than that but the conflict can be painted in such easy to understand strokes) and it was a war of many different fronts and many different stories. The Great War remains fascinating though - as the backdrop to some of the most horrific wastes of life, as the definition of the utter futility of war, as the death blow for British Empire (the Empire grew after the war in fact IIRC, but the UK became less able to service it's colonies in the aftermath), and so on. It is a difficult conflict though, as said... it's a war of empires. That sets it in stark contrast as a very... difficult war to reflect on.

The Culture books don't strictly have a reading order but there are definitely points to begin, and a couple of books should be read after others - most notably Consider Phlebas should be read before Look to Windward as the latter deals with events following the former. Excession should be read after you've got a few books under your belt as the entire thing is effectively an in joke about what would happen if the Culture encountered something it didn't understand. And while it's not a Culture novel, Inversions should be read at some point too. Also a lot of the books have references to each other which you can miss if you've skipped around. The Player of Games is a good jumping on point, Consider Phlebas is a bit odd for an introduction to the series as the Culture are more of a background feature (they're presented as the opposition in a war taking place largely at arms length), whereas the Player of Games features the Culture prominently in a decent standalone story that introduces a lot of recurring themes and ideas.

Once you get the ship the game changes considerably. It still has the usual Assassin's Creed foibles (the chase missions are shite, the traversal system still fails at the worst moments, the eavesdrop missions are rubbish) but the ship stuff is strangely addictive and brilliant. Until it gives you a follow mission in a ship. No, seriously. I laughed when that mission appeared.

Our main problem is our squad is almost universally shite. It's not any one area of the team, almost none of it is upto task in defence, midfield or attack.

Maynard is too busy doing his own thing, presumably. Even if most of that has been awful. 8 years though... about time for a new album. Bloody love Tool.

I've mentioned this a few times in similar threads on here, IIRC. I have throughout my life had snippets of very 'real' dreams that subsequently happen and give me quite incredible deja vu. They are always small, usually pretty mundane moments, which on waking up I'll recall but slowly lose them as time goes on. I'll then have the 'moment' I dreamt happen, a few weeks or months later. It used to happen more when I was kid, but every once in a while I still have it happen. The example I always think of happened when I was at school - I dreamt of a few seconds of my walk home. It was incredibly vivid, I can remember tiny details about it all, right down to the way I was walking, the way I was looking, how I felt at that moment. I was walking along a road, just before I turned a corner on my route, there was a yellow car parked up on my left and bloke walking towards me on my right, who looks at me as he walks past. And thats it. 5, 10 seconds of a walk home. It was so real it struck me and I remembered it as I woke up. A couple of months later, on my walk home, heading towards the corner onto the main road of my route, I walked past the same yellow car, and the same man walked past me and glanced at me as he passed. The strange thing was I get a feeling of knowing whats about to happen when I stumble on the moment, and then get immense deja vu after. As said, it happened more when I was younger, stopped almost entirely when I was at uni, and now happens every once in a while. Most recently I had it happen where I recalled an argument - in the dream I could feel the anger/sorrow at having the argument in chest, and then it came to pass, just that one moment of an argument. I've also had it recall a moment at work recently where a mistake had been made (not my own, but someone in my team) and I recalled the tight feeling anxiety as I carried on my own tasks as my boss and a couple of colleagues discussed it going on around me. It's very odd. I've always wondered what it was and all I've ever come to is that it's my brain running through moments that may happen in my every day life and sometimes one sticks in the memory for it's clarity and, eventually, it happens. On the more normal side of things, I've had recurring themes numerous times - I've had a variation of theme where I'm travelling through some nightmarish land with friends in a car, we stop at a services and I get left behind and get stranded and try to catch up and end up lost. And I've also had numerous dreams where I get stabbed in the stomach - these have been so vivid I've jerked awake before now.

OLED is potentially brilliant tech - talk of all the benefits of plasma with less drawbacks, etc etc. The curved thing they're doing, however, is entirely cosmetic - they've only done it to show off the ability of the technology, and it actually makes the screen less flexible for use in the home - you can't wall mount it, for example. But a couple of generations down the line, OLED might be a fabulous no brainer option. Will be fantastic for soundbar manufacturers as well, OLED screens can be so thin that a speaker would be beyond shit (even worse than the LED screens we already have).

Tangled That's it ...any good ? Does it justify the cost Never seen it, I understand its meant to be pretty good though. IIRC the cost on Tangled came about because they spent years making it, they did a lot of new CGI development on it to get the right look and also develop the right behaviour and look for the hair.

Also saw Kick Ass 2 today. I love the first one but had heard the second is shite. I felt that was a little harsh on it, but the sequel definitely has the feeling of a film that has a joke that worked once and was always going to feel tired second time around. Also feels... more cynical than the first film somehow.

Tangled

Saw Frozen earlier. Proper old fashioned Disney fare, feels like something they'd have made 20 years ago but with some modern sensibilities. It's surprisingly good. The Disney short beforehand, however, is painfully shite. Goes on for far too long and at no point threatens to be in any way entertaining.

Having a pop at the fans never ends well.

A Batman graphic novel, a couple of Iain M Banks books, some Thorntons fudge, a hoody, some money, a Villa key ring bottle opener, a Coca Cola icebucket with 5 glass bottles of Coca Cola. Can't complain. Also got 2 selection boxes from work.

I ended up watching a bit of it. I still don't get the appeal.

AC4 may be the best Assassins Creed game...

Yes thats my thinking - he's had the time to respond to my raising an issue pretty much immediately, but wasn't able to contact me to head off any issue before it became one. He's asked me to close the case which isn't happening as thats my first line of protection. I'm not sure whether to respond and say sorry to hear about his nan, but I'm not going to close the case, leave it as is or go to eBay and raise the issue further. His whole response reads like someone laying it on thick with a made up story, in my view, but again I am one of the least trusting and most cynical people I know.

I hate eBay sometimes. I bought something on there 10 days ago, never got dispatched. It's not a Christmas present or anything so I wasn't worried about getting it in for tomorrow or anything, but I did expect it to arrive timely, especially as I made payment immediately. A week was long enough imo, but gave 10 days to give some leeway in case there was an issue with the money. Still no dispatch today so, had enough, contact the seller and, since I'm not too familiar with eBay also end up opening a case for a refund - the item is available elsewhere for similar money so I'm not beholden to getting it from this particular seller and would just like my money back so that's alright. Chap replies, apparently before the auction finished his grandmother died and he's traveled to her funeral, very sorry for the inconvenience, he's very upset and could I do him a favour, close the case and he guarentees I'll get a refund on the 3rd. Which would make it about 20 days since the auction ended that he's back. At no point has he contacted me that there may be an issue, and I must admit the email doesn't ring very true to me somehow - I am a cynical bastard though. Kinda don't know what to do now. I know i'm not closing the case, though. Do I tell him sorry to hear that, but the case is staying open? Go to eBay and explain that I'm suspicious, as they suggest if you don't get contacted by the seller or aren't satisfied with the response to do so? Hmm.