Life 2.0

In some ways, online life - or even just MS Word - is superior to real life. There are so many things possible on a computer that don’t exist in real life – but I wish they would.  Here are my Top 5.

5. First of all, there are screenshots – more than once I’ve wanted to take a screenshot of something I was looking at. I felt rather silly for obvious reasons, but then someone on bash.org encountered the same problem, so while I may not be in the most desirable of companies, at least I'm not the only one. It's this far down on the list because while they're a lot faster and you would be able to use them anywhere at any time, we still have something very similar - it's called a camera.

4.  Then there’s Undo. I don’t tend to regret things, what’s done is done and I’ll just have to deal with it, but once in a while an undo function would be nice. I dropped something, I said something stupid… one click or flick of a switch and I can start over. And of course, I can get a lot better at it, because I’d have an infinite number of tries. I suppose life would also slow down considerably if everyone undid things all the time, but sacrifices have to be made. Alternatively I wouldn’t mind being the only one with access to those functions. 

Speaking of which, I just accidentally deleted an entire paragraph and can't find an Undo option. This is what I get for praising the internet.

3. Another thing I really miss is a search function. There have been occasions when I was skimming a book or some other text, looking for something, until the brilliant idea to just press Ctrl+F hit me - imagine my disappointment when I realised that real life lacks that function. 

2. We also desperately need an Escape button. No long, drawn-out conversations with someone you don't want to talk to, no awkward encounters, nothing at all that you don't want to happen or that you don't want to be involved in... "Sorry, my life crashed".

1. And of course then there’s the soundtrack. It's less useful than all the other functions, and perhaps Escape is the one we need the most, but I’d dare you to be sad for long if dramatic strings started playing the second something unfortunate happened to you.

To everyone who does not know the meaning of 'sleep'

I'm glad you've got friends, it's great that you got a guitar for Christmas and your new amp and bass guitar are pretty cool too. Congrats too for finally getting laid. See, I understand you being proud of all those things, but is it really that hard to shut up between 11pm and 8am? Is it? I will admit that this place is a step up from last year's not so sound-proof cardboard walls, but investing in some nice thick walls and proper doors wasn't this architect's strong point either. I suppose he forgot that students were going to live here, and that students do not always possess normal people's common sense and courtesy to perhaps avoid loud activies in the middle of the night. I can't tell where those assorted noises are coming from as they seem to be everywhere at once and me deciding to have a word with the people who are responsible for it in the early hours of the morning probably wouldn't be too pretty, so I'll have to address them here.

If you want to make our ears bleed in time for dinner, go for it. I'll even put up with being woken up at 9 on a Saturday because it's bright and warm and you cannot resist greeting the sun with your rendition of Dancing Queen. But stop being a douche and go to sleep at midnight or at least resort to doing something quiet. I'd suggest just sitting down with your laptop or reading a book, but then last year my neighbour's MSN Messenger alerts kept me up. Either way, just be quiet, it's not my fault you're cooler than me. Really, shut up.

Some people just lack the ability to imagine that the world does not revolve them and that other people couldn't care less about how well they can play the same stupid riff fifty times in a row at 2am.

Book survey

One book you’re currently reading: None. I've only got three books with me because they take up a lot of space/weight. I just finished rereading A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini though.

One book that changed your life: Angela's Ashes -- Frank McCourt. Like Ziggy said, I'm not all that sure how, but it certainly gave me a sense of history. This is what things really were like not too long ago. 

One book you’d want on a deserted island: Moon - The Life and Death of a Rock Legend, by Tony Fletcher. It's huge, it's a great read, it's full of facts so I'd hopefully never get bored and it's almost like listening to music. And perhaps Robinson Crusoe... you know, get some inspiration.

One book you’ve read more than once: 1984 -- George Orwell

One book you’ve never been able to finish: War and Peace -- Leo Tolstoy. Hey, you're supposed to read this once in your life. I've found it online too so I COULD read it if I wanted to, but... um. We'll see.

One book that made you laugh: Dinner for Two -- Mike Gayle. It seemed more like a book aimed at girls, but it was funny. Assorted calculus books would probably qualify too - you know that feeling when you just have to laugh because you haven't got a clue?

One book that made you cry: None. As for most touching... I'll go with A Thousand Splendid Suns for now.

One book you keep rereading: Nunaga -- Duncan Pryde. It's the autobiography of some Scottish guy who lived in the Arctic in a couple of Eskimo settlements for a few years, back when they still hunted for food and their means of transportation were dog sleds.

One book you’ve been meaning to read: I've been meaning to read the Kite Runner too, I've only seen the movie. Now I suppose Ishmael is on my to-read list as well.

One book you believe everyone should read: Shantaram -- Gregory David Roberts. I know I'm late, but if you're as late as me and haven't read it yet, do so now. And every child should read the Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Finally,

Grab the nearest book. Open it to page 56. Find the fifth sentence: "There is considerable interaction between the CNS and PNS."