I Belive I'll Ice My Broom.

 I've become obsessed with the curling.

 Not because I find it exciting or interesting, but because I'm constantly baffled as to how it's a thing.

 Honestly, it's the stupidest sport I've ever seen. It's essentially bowls for people whose lawns have frozen over, but with the added fun of sweeping up.

 I've got no idea who came up with the game but it must have involved cold weather and people with far too much time on their hands. Or brain damage. Or both.

 If I had to guess I'd say it was a group of spectacularly bored roadsweepers from Finland. Or maybe it was invented as a way to distract the four stupidest men in Norway, and it's now somehow gone Olympic.

 I've already complained about the Winter Olympics being chock-full of non-sports that are solely the preserve of the wealthy, but even on that skewed playing field, curling stands out, not least for it's thudding pomposity. According to Wikipedia, fans of the sport sometimes refer to it as "Chess on ice."

 No it fucking isn't. It's sliding a stone across a frozen pond. It's basically that game where you skip stones across the surface of a lake, but for people too thick or ham-fisted to pull it off under normal conditions. It's stone-skimming for the mentally handicapped.

 A player for the GB women's team said that the curlers were in the gym twice a day, seven days a week to prepare. It's a crime that interviewer Clare Balding didn't immediately ask the obvious question: "Why?!"

 There's no point going to the gym to learn curling. A polished stone slides across ice with almost zero friction, so it's not like it requires much muscle to get the process started, and the part with the broom could be perfected by twenty minutes of light yard work.

 Not that many curlers would understand the normal use of a broom. I'm sure these are, once again, mostly wealthy people. They can't possibly have day jobs if they're "training" that often. Or perhaps they did have day jobs and gave them up when they made it big on the curling circuit - supporting themselves now through Eskimo sponsorship deals and autograph-signing tours of Greenland.

 The only way I can imagine having fun with curling would be to turn up at a match and be lairy in the stands. Sing modified football chants and shout "Who are ya?!" at the other team - although that would be necessary anyway as I have absolutely no idea who any of the participants are. It's at least fun to try to think up curling chants. "You're Not Sweeping Anymore" and "You're going home in a fucking... er... sleigh!" and so forth.

 Sadly, I'm told such behaviour is frowned upon at Sochi. Is there nothing the Russians aren't intolerant of?!

I Fought The Law...

 I was a pretty late-comer to Twitter. Initially, it seemed faddy and pointless, and not really my scene, but when I eventually joined I began to see its benefits. Depending on who you follow, it's a good way of keeping up with the news, it can teach you interesting things or show you amusing content, and it's a wonderfully democratic system. One of my favourite Twitter moments was when the Pope decided to create an official account, and thanked everyone for following him. Irish writer Graham Linehan responded with something along the lines of "Hey, don't fucking mention it!"

 Where else except Twitter could you swear directly at the Pope?!

 It's because of this direct contact between everyone, famous or otherwise, that I ended up in an argument with Nick Searcy, who plays Deputy Chief Art Mullen in TV's "Justified."

Here he is in the time-honoured TV police chief act of "looking displeased with subordinates."

 I'm a big fan of "Justified," so was surprised when the journalist Tony Ortega implied that a cast member had refused an interview because of his right-wing views. Clicking the link, it turned out that Nick Searcy's Twitter feed is basically a long list of him referring to atheists as "shit eating pussies," or similar. When Ortega asked to interview him about his Twitter feed and unusually blunt style of interaction with the public, Searcy refused, saying that he didn't trust Ortega's publication and that he thought he'd be referred to as a bigot or a right-winger.

 Having checked Searcy's twitter feed, I initially posted the fairly innocuous comment that I was going to start a game where participants have to drink every time Nick Searcy tweets the words "fucking," "atheist," "shit-eating" or "pussy."

 Don't actually attempt this game, by the way. It would almost certainly be fatal.

 Because of that, I started following the whole thing as it unravelled.

 Searcy tweeted the following:

  I think he was aiming for sarcasm, there. Saying that only pussies hide their identity. But, as I pointed out:

  My grammatical quibbling provoked a response.

 I was pretty sure all Bibles are the same...

 

 First of all, yes, that does actually happen in the Bible. And secondly, yes, zing, I just made fun of a bald guy. It's also worth pointing out that the limitations of the 140-character medium mean it's hard to make a joke work properly, so my phrasing wasn't ideal. "Or were you secretly hoping for that to happen again?" would have worked way better, but was over my word-limit.

 Searcy, by the way, didn't respond after that.

 So, on the one hand, I got into a minor spat with a TV actor and got off a pretty good joke at his expense.

 Then I got to thinking.

 See, I like "Justified." And I like Nick Searcy in it. I think he's a good actor. I just don't agree with him on politics or religion. Going back to the incident that started the whole thing, Tony Ortega asked him for an interview and he said no, because he thought Ortega would paint him as a right-wing bigot.

 Ortega then posted an article with the headline "Nick Searcy Asked Us Not To Call Him ... 'Ultra-Con[servative]' Or 'Bigot.'"

 Searcy was then 100% correct to point out that he never asked not to be referred to in those terms. He didn't ask anything at all. He merely stated that he was unwilling to submit to an interview and gave his reasons.

 Searcy, by the way, has an adopted son who is black, so I think it's fair to say he's not a bigot. I'd argue that he IS right-wing, but then he seems to think (based on some more Twitter digging) that right-wing views and fascism are about telling people what to do, which he is against, and which he thinks the Democratic party are guilty of. And again, I agree with his feelings, if not his logic. I hate when the government (in any country) starts telling people how to live their lives.

 As soon as I stepped outside my little Twitter-bubble and made an effort to see things his way (ie: from the point of view of an actor whose work I like) I realised we probably had far more in common than I'd initially assumed. Sure, he's unpleasant to atheists like me, but then how many times do people tweet him to give him shit about being religious? I can't imagine how snappy I'd get if I constantly had religious people telling me I was an idiot for not believing. He's also probably right that anonymously sending someone abuse is cowardly. (For the record, my Twitter handle is my full name.)

 I think anyone who believes in a god is at best misguided and at worst actively damaging their lives and those of others around them. But then, religious people probably feel the same about unbelievers like me. I think Nick Searcy's Twitter feed is unpleasant an unoriginal, but then the messages he gets are probably unpleasant and unoriginal, too.

 The more I think about it, the more I feel that Twitter is one of the worst culprits when it comes to entrenching positions. You can't make a reasoned, nuanced argument in 140 characters or less. It's impossible when it comes to issues as big as theology or the governance of a country. This means that any Twitter interaction on complex subjects is rapidly reduced to pointless sniping and cartoonishly simplified arguments.

 So I'm going to do my best from now on to stay out of Twitter arguments, because they're pointless. I'd advise Nick Searcy to do the same; it's possible he's just a complete asshole, but I suspect that he's actually not a bad guy. He's not a guy I agree with about much, but that doesn't mean anything. We're all flawed and human and as such we need to stop letting the physical and psychological divisions created by the internet goad us into petty squabbles. Maybe you have a totally different political or religious viewpoint from someone you know and like in real life - if you'd met that person on Twitter you'd probably be sending each other snarky and unpleasant messages instead of being friends.

 And Nick, wherever you are out there, I don't believe in God. I'm in favour of socialism. But I understand why you get pissed off on Twitter, I also hate overbearing government, and I still think you're good in "Justified."

Share My Cock.

 It's fair to say that these days, once you post something online, it's out there forever. Probably in the vaults of the NSA, but that's a paranoid theory for another time.

 The internet - or at least, the version of the internet familiar to the common man - is young enough, and grew so rapidly, that we're all struggling to catch up, and it leaves some parents paranoid about what their teenagers might get up to online (hint: wanking) and whether it's safe to do so (hint: not if you take pictures of it.)

 A while back, someone decided to post a picture on social media, with a caption along the lines of "please share this picture, I'm trying to teach my students how fast something can spread online." That was a good idea and a smart way to prove a point, but as the internet is basically a giant echo chamber of narcissism, it rapidly spawned a billion copycats.

 As a species, we don't need to do everything ourselves. Like higher primates and some types of corvid, we can learn from others without having the same experiences. When Edward Jenner invented the Smallpox vaccine, everyone around him didn't immediately start working on their own alternative. They saw what he did, said "That's a good idea!" and learned from it. Had we adopted this same attitude with the initial "please share" post, we could have taken one person's good idea and actually seen how far it went. By the end of the process, we'd be able to cite it as an example and actually tell students how far an online post can go.

 Instead, the current crop of pictures in the "share this to teach my students/girl scouts/orphanage/underage employees at the Nike factory about internet safety" are just a bunch of desperate "me too" copycats who are actually hindering the initial experiment. The first message sent out is now lost amongst the thousands of similar ones by sad, lonely people who in all likelihood have nothing to do with education or kids, and just wanted to start their own little message in a bottle as an ego boost, with the net effect that all of Twitter and Facebook are now littered with unread bottles that nobody gives a fuck about.

 So if you see something online that's a good idea, maybe appreciate it for what it is instead of feeling the urge to join in. And if you are a teacher, please don't add to the problem by lazily starting your own experiment. The initial data is now totally lost and it's the fault of yet another internet fad that's been pummeled so relentlessly that it's lost all meaning.

 And if you're sick of seeing "share this photo to teach kids" posts, then please, show someone this picture of my cock.

 I'm posting this picture of my cock, not to show people that if you upload a picture of your own cock, it'll get shared a lot by people you don't know - although it will. I'm not uploading it to show off, even though it's a magnificent specimen. I'm not uploading it to prove that my cock can be shared by lots of people in succession quite comfortably, or that it can, if handled enough, reach all the way to Australia, even though all of the above is true.

 I'm posting it in the hopes that maybe my cock can be a force for good, for once, and we can put an end to this tedious "please share" business.

 Enough is enough. Share my cock if you agree.

Sochi-alism.

 The winter Olympics, not normally the most controversial of events, has been giving reporters some problems.

 On the one hand, it's awkward having to validate anything Russia does when they still have an appalling record on pretty much every issue you can name. Aside from the well publicised and virulent homophobia, there's the fact that stray dogs are habitually rounded up and shot by the police, and the lesser known fact that a staggering one-third of Russians still think the Sun revolves around the earth due to the overall paucity of Russian education.

 Then there's the corruption, the cronyism, the psychotic national leader with a history of murdering people, the almost national alcoholism, and the fact that they have a fairly slipshod grasp of their own nuclear arsenal. All in all, it's not a country that really deserves much positive attention on any level.

 At the same time, there are the athletes to consider. All of their training and efforts would have come to nothing if their respective parent nations had boycotted the Sochi Olympics, and even if these games are being held in an unpleasant country, it would be cruel to deny these kids their dreams. It's a tricky Catch-22 that other, more established (read: paid) commentators are struggling with.

 Luckily, as the drunkest and most unpaid of all news pundits, I've decided on a policy of fuck 'em. The Russians AND the athletes.

 This is because almost none of the sports involved in the Winter Olympics are actually proper sports. These aren't games that are open to everyone in the world, as the Summer Olympics - otherwise known as "The Olympics" - are. These are largely games for the rich and bored.

 Think about it. The reason that poor nations in East Africa have come to dominate distance running in recent years is that there's no financial barrier to it. Everyone with a working set of legs can run. Genetically speaking, a lot of East African tribes have a predisposition to slow-twitch muscle fibers, which make them excellent endurance athletes. That they have, in recent years, proved this in international contests is testimony to the egalitarianism of sport.

 Of course, excellent endurance skills are also needed for cross country skiing, but we'll never see a Kenyan champion at that. Why? Because it's too fucking expensive. Sure, Africa is hot, but athletes could always practice on indoor ski-slopes or book flights to Sweden if they were serious, right?

 Of course not. Both of those things are too expensive for the average first-world resident, let alone someone who's practicing running in third-hand Nikes.

 Same goes for things like snowboarding. Have you ever met a professional snowboarder? Me neither. I don't move in the right circles. I know plenty of builders and bus drivers and barmen, all of whom would laugh in your face if you tried to pretend that "snowboarder" was an actual job. But I've never met a snowboarder, except once when I was in Austria and was given smirky looks by a group of them when I took a cable car up an Alp, sans-snowboard, just for the experience. I'd spent most of my money on the trip, and couldn't really afford ski or snowboard rental even if I had felt the urge to attempt it. I just decided to go to the top of the mountain for fun, and possibly to scream "DRAGO!!!" at the setting sun. For this, my other cable car passengers gave me a distinctly judgemental vibe, as though one of the servants had sat at the dinner table.

 Once again, winter sports aren't something that just anyone can do. Future Olympic gold medallist Anthony Joshua was given a slap on the wrist after being arrested dealing weed. Whilst that doesn't set the best example, I can guess why he was doing it: Money. People who can afford winter sport gear and long trips to cold climates to practice with said equipment never get busted selling pot because they don't need to. They're already fucking loaded.

 So let's stop pandering to these "athletes" and their precious dreams. I'll grant that some of the participants are from colder climes, and good luck to them. I'm sure skiing, for the Finnish, is as instinctive as running for the finish would be to Kenyans, but for the UK, all we're doing is cheering on a bunch of hoorays as they practice their niche little hobbies that most of us could never afford.

 So, fuck the Winter Olympics. Fuck the Russians and their insane, homophobic, failed-superpower backwater, and if fobbing them off means Tarquin and Conrad don't get to toboggan for the crowd, well, fuck them too. Their dream might have been to go skiing for a living, and daddy might have spent a lot funding it, but there are people in this country whose dream is to not freeze to death through outright poverty this winter, and until they're looked after, the rich can play in the snow off their own backs.

Cure For Cancer Linked To Boredom

 Gamers are a notoriously petulant and fickle crowd. There was uproar when the final part of the Mass Effect trilogy was released with what was perceived as a weak ending. Never mind that for countless hours, the three games had kept people entertained. The ending wasn't as good as players wanted, and they all started bitching about it.

 As a result of this kind of thing, game players can often come off an entitled dickheads. It's difficult, then, to complain about "Play To Cure: Genes In Space", a smartphone game which aims to help cancer research by crowd-sourcing data. Rest assured, however, that complain I will.

 For a few years now, science has been farming out difficult number-crunching to the public. The Playstation 3 had a "Folding At Home" app which you could leave running in the background, where your PS3's un-used computing power worked on complicated protein-folding simulations that would have taken years with conventional computers. The idea was that if a million people were using "Folding At Home," the vast amounts of data were being processed through a million computers instead of one, with the eventual results collated by researchers.

 This was a nice idea and I tried to use Folding At Home as much as possible, just to feel like I was doing something positive. In the same vein (or possibly in the same amino acid) I downloaded "Play To Cure" because I was aware it was helping cancer research and because I like games.

 Sadly, it's a shitty game.

 The premise sees the player as a space pilot collecting valuable ore by flying through a series of hoops. Before missions, players are required to look at a map and decide where the hoops should be to accrue maximum ore. This is clearly the actual research data needed, but sadly, most of the maps will see players flying in an almost perfectly straight line. Even the more convoluted maps don't particularly tax the player; you just have to turn your smartphone slightly and then head towards the next hoop.

 Obstacles are provided in the form of incoming asteroids, which you have to shoot with underwhelming lasers. The whole thing is incredibly pedestrian which, for those unaware, is the exact antonym to space flight.

This route-map is way more complicated than the ones I've seen. Although it's entirely possible I'm shit at curing cancer.

 

 

 I really don't mean to be hard-hearted by criticising a game made with the best possible intentions, but with the game being so dull the whole endeavour rapidly takes on an "eat your vegetables" quality. I'll play it because I'm in favour of helping cancer research, but there are plenty of other mobile games with no social value that are way more fun.

 In a way I find it slightly patronising. If someone released an app that just asked me to put my phone down for five minutes and not use it while it did some calculations on the genetic anomalies that cause tumours I'd be all for it. But don't try to lure me in by pretending I'll get to do something fun, especially when it's not much fun at all.

 If anything, just give me screen after screen of the maps - which, again, are a visual representation of DNA and are what the researchers are actually interested in. I'd be more than happy to do a few of those when I had a spare five minutes, just to balance out my karma a little. Besides, I smoke, I drink heavily and I eat a poor diet. Curing cancer is something I have a vested interest in from the get-go.

 Maybe it's just me; maybe other people aren't nerdy enough and have to have their pills sugared with a mediocre space-shooter. But honestly, I can't be fucked flying any more dreary missions. All they're telling the scientists behind the programme is that I'm not very good at shooting asteroids, which I could have told them via e-mail or text questionnaire if they'd just asked me. 

 Someone should release a far simpler game for this kind of research - one that is less deliberately camouflaged as something else - and they might be surprised by how many people are willing to help.