The most annoying thing about people who have a twitter, is that they always have to tell you that they have a twitter. The second most annoying thing about people who have a twitter, is that they always have to tell you how many “followers” they have. The third most annoying thing about people who have a twitter, is, well, I don’t know. I generally stop listening to them by that stage. But I often wonder how many of the “followers” actually follow them on twitter. So I did a bit of research to come up with the How Many Twits Like You Theory. Unfortunately, to do such research I myself had to set up a twitter account. And I have 25 followers, thanks for asking.

Before I get into the nitty gritty of how many people actually follow you, there is an important theoretical distinction to make. There are two main groups of people who use twitter: celebrities and nobodies. The formulas for each group are different.

Celebrities.

The formula for celebrities is easy. The number of twits who like you = “followers”. Case in point, Katy Perry. On twitter she has 7,136,467 “followers”, and 7,136,467 people actually follow her on twitter.

Nobodies.

For nobodies, the formula is a great deal more complicated. There are a number of people you must subtract from your “followers” to arrive at the true number of twits who like you.

People you must subtract:

• Creepy internet men. (10%)
• The duplicate accounts of creepy internet men. (20%)
• People trying to sell you stuff (5%)
• Sexy females, who are actually creepy internet men. (20%)
• Hip businesses that have twitter accounts (10%)

Case in point, me. I have 25 followers. From this I need to subtract creepy internet men (2.5 followers), the duplicate accounts of creepy internet men (5 followers), people that are trying to sell me stuff (1.25 followers), sexy females who are actually creepy internet men (5 followers) and hip businesses that have twitter accounts (2.5) followers. This totals 16.25 people I need to subtract. Of course we can’t have a quarter of a person, so we’ll use the rounding rules that you learnt in grade 3, which brings it down to 16 people I need to subtract. So I have 9 (25-16) twits who like me.

So thanks to the How Many Twits Like You Theory, you can now work out how many people actually follow your twitter account.

Unfortunately due to uni work pressure, I haven’t had time to do another webcomic. So here’s some teenage mutant ninja brussel sprouts that I made at work the other day.

Finally the return of the Jedi, after uni work struck back. As you may have gathered, I took a siesta from blogging as the first lot of uni assignments drew near. Now those assignments are gone, I have a couple of weeks on my hands while in denial about my midsemester exams. So I thought I’d let you in on my latest rough workings of yet another open mic set. In other words, I haven’t had any flashes of inspiration for a post since I decided to write one at midday today.

Advertising is everywhere. Too most people it is also annoying, rather bland or feels like a scam. But I try and look at it a bit differently, by seeing the opportunities it presents for me to improve my life. If I bought everything from every advert I saw, I could have the closest shave possible on my pimple free face, which my girlfriend will appreciate while I last longer in bed. After which I’d take a shower in my newly tiled bathroom (with lifetime guarantee), where I can admire my better defined abs, partly due to the ab circle pro, but also helped by the fact that every sandwich I eat has 6 grams of fat (or less), and that only costs me $4.95 with a coke zero. And that keeps my bank balance healthy, on which I earn an awesome interest rate because I took financial advise from the talking orangutan from ING Direct.

You know what’s hard about listening to AMI ads? Knowing you’re not.

“Before I called AMI, I only lasted as long as an ad break on NOVA. But after I smsed a rather innocent word out of context (longer), I now last as long as a proactive acne solution infomercial at 4 in the morning.”

46% of advertisements rely on some form of statistics to influence you. 50% of them are backed by real data, while 64% of them just make up percentages on the spot. 19% avoid round number percentages because they make people suspicious of their authenticity, 20% use round number percentages because they are easier to remember, one third will use factions, .025 will use proportions and 1 in 4 advertisers will use natural frequencies because they are better understood by 9 out of 10 people.

The lynx effect is probably one of the most controversial ad campaigns in recent Australian memory. The basic premise is that using lynx deodorant will get you ladies. And the more you spray, the more ladies you will get. Laughable right? I mean the stuff smells terrible. But in theory it should work. First you spray so much of your favourite/least despised lynx deodorant on without freezing your skin. Then you go to your favourite/least despised bar and talk to the ladies. The sheer amount of lynx you put on will make said ladies you are talking to light headed. Not because they are falling head over heals for you, but because of the lack of oxygen in your cloud of your favourite/least despised lynx scent. The oxygen deprivation combined with the laughing gas properties of lynx will soon have the ladies giggling at all of your jokes. Even the AMI ones. After some time the oxygen deprivation will reach a point where it distorts their perception and cripples their decision making abilities that they suddenly realise that you are the most attractive male specimen they have ever seen and offer to go home with you. However, like many psychological theories of behaviour, it doesn’t work in the real world.

And that was an insight into some of the notes of an open mic set that I was working on about a month ago. I’ll hopefully get some inspiration for an actual blog post soon. Also in non-writing related news, I finally figured out how to ad a facebook “like” button on my blog posts (as seen below).

And in more exciting slightly writing related news, I am considering starting a web comic project, called Comic Stripping. Don’t worry, it will be all draw and all tasteful. So keep and eye out in the foreseeable future.

As many of you know, the reason I am keeping this blog is to generate and test material that will eventually get turned into an open mic set. I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that I’ve finished a rough draft of a set. The bad news is that I don’t feel it’s up to standard and won’t be performing it just yet. I’m currently working on a second set about advertising, a topic that I like a bit more.

So I decided to post the rough content of the public transport set for you guys to read, rather than never letting it see the light of day. Bare in mind it’s fairly rough. I also haven’t developed a consistent style yet, so there will be a mix of punchlines and actouts (which I am aware don’t work overly well in written form, but oh well).

Everyone knows the pains of public transport. The long wait in a long line with people who haven’t showered in a long time. All to hop in an even more confined space with them, and pay for the privilege. This is how we get to work every morning. Unless of course you drive an Audi, BMW or a Merc. Or a Volkswagen, or a Citroen, or a Renault. Or a Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Subaru, Nissan, Ford, Holden, Kia, Daewoo or Daihatsu. Hell, even if you drove a Hyundai you wouldn’t catch a bus. At least on the days it doesn’t break down.

There’s always one kooky passenger on the bus. You know, a carriage short of a train, a coin short of a return fare or a hull short of a city cat. But I digress. Point being they look a little bit mental. Not mental enough to be unable to use public transport, but mental enough that you don’t want them to sit next to you. Go cards you touch on, me you don’t.

Go cards make paying for the bus fare almost too easy. Now you don’t even have to count change. Now I’m all for convenience, but it has to stop at a certain point. Do we really want people who can’t count riding on buses? Where would they go anyway? “I’m going to 87 Queen St., don’t worry I can find it. It’s right next door to 246 Queen St. and I know where that is.” “I made a killing at the casino today, I played this wheel game with plastic notes and won this tiny gold coin!”

But really, it is very convenient not to have to carry coinage around. It makes me wonder why more places don’t accept payment by go card. “Alright lads, now here’s the deal. You’ve got a 5 minute private dance with Honey. Please have a breath mint before she starts, don’t bother asking her out for a drink and most importantly no touching! Unless of course you are paying by go card, then just touch on and touch off.

Fares are on the rise again. Now they cost as much as a cup of coffee. But are the two really comparable? A cup of coffee is just a cup of coffee, but a bus fare, you can go many places with a bus fare. For example, you could take a girl out on a date with a bus fare. As long as she lives within two zones of your house. And the restaurant is along the bus route. And you must remember to bring spare change to pay for her bus fare, so that you don’t look any less pathetic. Actually, that cup of coffee is looking pretty good right now.

Late night buses are like rollercoasters. They take corners way too quickly, they’re packed with young people and you always wish they had more safety features. The only difference is the guy behind you throws up for an entirely different reason. (The premise for this joke actually came from Bec’s facebook, and I’m yet to ask her if I can use this observation).

Security guards on trains are not the same as security guards everywhere else. You wouldn’t even think about taking on a security guard at a pub, but even I fancy my chances with a security guard on the train. There are two kinds of train security guards: old men trying to keep their minds active and scrawny Indian men how make me look like a body builder. Who are they going to save you from. If a guy pulls a knife on you, what’s the train security guard going to do? “Ohhh sonny boy, you’d best not do that. I know your great grandmother. Don’t think this won’t get back to her!” Guess who’s getting stabbed and robbed tonight. Or if a drunk guy tries to crack onto you and your friends. “Hey ladies, you, me and a bottle of Baileys? Some tunes, my hot tub and we’ll see where it goes from there?” What’s the train security guard going to do? “Excuse me sir, but back in my country we do not court women like that. How about I get both your parents’ phone numbers, we’ll arrange a meeting of the families, and we’ll see where it goes from there?” No, that won’t deter that drunk guy from hitting on you, whether you are Megan Fox or look like me.

So that was the rough copy of what was formerly going to be my first open mic set. I’m a little scared to ask for feedback. About as scared as I am of catching a train late at night. But I suppose it would be good. So if you have thoughts, and are uninhibited enough to comment, please do.

University. Can’t live with it. Can’t get a job without it, according to John Howard. The usual new semesters resolutions have been made and broken. I will do all my reading this year. I will revise my lecture notes each week. And I will catch the bus to save money. Three weeks in, the only thing I’ve read are status updates on facebook, it looks like I’ll be cramming for exams again this year and have already been on the emotional rollercoaster of trying to find a park at 10 o’clock in the morning.

Since returning I have rediscovered the joys of coffee. It’s cheap, delicious and I get to catch up with people again. Come to think of it, I can’t remember why I stopped drinking it in the first place. Good thing I had all night to think of why.

I remember when it was easy to find a seat in lectures because the only people who turned up early were Asian students and mature aged students. Since changing to business, I have discovered that about 95% of my course was either an Asian student or a mature aged student, in the five minutes I walked up and down the isles looking for a seat.

In other news the biol library is now open 24/7. There are a growing number of places now open around the clock. Petrol stations and convenience stores were the first. Then both McDonalds and gyms started around the same time, which I find slightly ironic. Now I can put the weight on, and work it off, at 3:30 in the morning. But I digress. The way the library is used has changed a bit since being open 24/7. It has now moved from the library locations website to the accommodation website, with some students choosing to spend the night. Group rooms are available overnight, with checkout at 10am. And the demand for the breakfast menu has risen 400% at the cafe downstairs. But it’s nice to know some things haven’t changed, like the “need” to look up breakdancing babies on youtube before you actually use the library computers for anything constructive.

One thing I’ve learnt this year is that business classes love acronyms. For example, SMART, Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Timely. Another thing I’ve learnt is that they always spell very inspiring words. You’d never see an acronym like DEAD, Direction Energy Attitude Determination, or FAIL, Focus Accuracy Intuition Learning. Personally I don’t think acronyms are effective. They’re just collections of vague words that happen to spell an inspirational word, which is loosely related to a concept that is too long and wordy to remember the whole thing. Perhaps I’m just jaded because when asked the question, how should business set objectives from their mission statements, all I can come up with was the word SMART, precisely what I did not feel like at that point in time.

I think I have wasted a sufficient amount of your time, and I really should get Back To The (Studies For My) Future. Lamest popculture reference to date. If you need me, I’ll be playing the new pokemon game, while pretending to study in my 1982 DeLorean. Should you be looking to procrastinate for a couple of minutes longer, read the accompanying webcomic below.

Like many Star Wars fans, there is a little part of me that thinks it would be the coolest thing ever if Star Wars was real. But in a world where we must settle for metal swords and ships that are confined to bodies of water, there are glimmers of hope that let us at least imagine what it would be like. The only reason I bought a Wii was in the hope for a lightsaber dueling game. I’d wager half of Wii owners bought it for this same reason. The remote even looks like a lightsaber hilt, if you spray paint it gray and squint.

But in my daydreams where I am a Jedi Knight, I couldn’t help but see a couple of flaws in the fantasy that real life was like Star Wars. Namely a couple of situations where force powers wouldn’t help in real life.

When trying to get a girls number. (Another unsuccessful night on the force pull).

When you don’t realise the door says pull. (Why isn’t force push working).

When you don’t perform in bed. (When is Yoda going to teach you force slow?).

When your phone battery dies while you are out shopping. (Force lightning is DC, and you need an AC current to charge your battery).

When your girlfriend gets pregnant. (I don’t know how this happened, honey I swear I used force protection when we did it).

So as you may have noticed I’ve taken a couple of days off from blogging, and will subsequently be taking a couple more to actually get some work done on material for my first open mic in the near future.

But in the spirit of slightly regular posts, here’s an extremely short, incomplete list of things I find ironic, at this point in time.

Ironman’s suit is built from a gold-titanium alloy.

Due to poor editing of the opening of the credits, there is a scientific inaccuracy in every single episode of the Big Bang Theory.

People who wear the shirt saying “Sarcasm is one of the services I offer” always look like the most unsarcastic people. But if indeed they are quite sarcastic, then the shirt is not.

Alcohol only inhibits one thing, inhibition.

In the case your phone isn’t working please call the customer helpline.

One of my favourite comics. Can you tell?

Dancing games, like many rhythm based games, have never really resembled the real thing. I for one have always laughed a little inside as I walked past Asian school kids furiously sweating it out on Dance Dance Revolution at the top of the Myer Centre, in the comfort of knowing that I would never play a dancing videogame, and that even if I did, I would look cooler.

So when Dance Central (a legit dancing game) came out I decided to give it a go. I can safely say that I ate my words as I actually played one, and no, I did not look cool. Even though I was performing the moves “flawlessly”, I still looked like a tool. So when they say, unleash your inner dancer, you need to know that at best you will look like Napoleon Dynamite.

It’s hard not to feel a little bit silly with little Australian flags jammed in your car windows. It’s made even worse by the air con in my car refusing to work. So when I see people driving with the windows down and no flags I can’t help by yell “show some pride and be like a bogan for once you unpatriotic bastard.” But they never hear me because my windows are wound up so I my little flags don’t fly away.

It’s hard shaking hands with cool people. They all have their own fancy handshake, that all the other cool people seem to know. For me, not only do I have to remember their names, but oh that’s So-and-so, her hand shake starts traditional, goes to the fingercurl, which transitions to a fist bump that explodes into spirit fingers on the follow through. And then I have to meet her friend, Blah-blah, and his hand shake is a flat five that sticks into an arm wrestle grip, then pull in for the one armed man hug.

Sidenote on the one armed man hug, the timing is critical. Pull away too early or pat too quickly and you’ll give the impression that you’re not friends. But linger too long or pat too slowly and you’ll give the impression that you want to be more than friends.

There are only three kinds of people who wear matching tracksuits. Young children, pensioners and teenage bogan mothers. No matter what brand names and teenage bogan mothers will tell you, there is no best of both worlds for comfort and style.

How did KFC gain such a reputation? Ever since a news story went public about a young girl that got salmonella poisoning, and subsequently got crippling brain damage, youths have been flocking to KFC’s around Australia to take their chances in this Kentucky Roulette.

KFC dealers caught doing business on the street.

“KFC is setting the new standard for hardcore. Drugs and alcohol are child’s play. Taking the chance of permanent brain damage from a single KFC meal, that’s the new radcore.” A local KFC user.

This is being a growing problem with many youths hanging out in and around the once family friendly restaurants. Hungry Jacks, a restaurant that once thrived on teenage angst, is now down 46% in business since KFC became a hit in the teenage angst scene. Experts suggest that if Hungry Jack’s can’t match brain damage soon they will start to lose street cred.

Family groups are outraged at this latest case of substance abuse. A spokesman for FSTTLA, Family’s Supporting Teenagers to Lower Angst, released this statement yesterday.

“Quite frankly we are shocked and appauled that parents and carers are actually funding their child’s KFC habit. As parents we should be uniting to fight against the sources of angst in our teenagers, such as failure at school, failure at love, failure at casual jobs, failure at skateboarding and brain damage. We will be holding counseling sessions for families whose teenagers are in the grips of KFC, where we will provide quitting strategies and how to reintroduce our teenagers to Hungry Jacks.”

The girl who unknowningly started this craze that turned into yet another downward spiral for Australia’s youth released this statement today.

“I never meant for this to happen. All I wanted that a Twister with two delicious 100% breast fillet Crispy Strips and fresh salad topped with pepper mayo all wrapped in a soft warm tortilla. I never wanted brain damage, or to be radcore.”

For all the concerned parents out there I have included the official world health organization’s guide for how to spot if your child is taking KFC.

Popculture zombies are the exact opposite of vampires. Vampires are fast, intelligent and sexy. Whereas zombies are slow, retarded and for all intensive purposes, unsexy. But I would like to argue that zombies would make the perfect boyfriends. Yes, they don’t look like Brad Pitt. And yes, they probably don’t have the cognitive ability to remember your anniversary. But that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t settle for one.

For starters they’ll never interrupt you when you’re talking about your day.

They will stare at your head area, rather than at your breasts.

Sports are too complicated for zombies to understand. So they are quite happy to watch the latest episode of The Hills with you.

They are bragable lovers, because their blood doesn’t serve any other purpose.

Because dangerous guys are attractive. It’s like having a boyfriend who rides a motorcycle, only more dangerous. Hence, more attractive.

They don’t talk back in an argument. Partly cause they can’t talk, and partly cause they love you.

And you’ve always wanted a man who doesn’t just love you for your body, but for your brains as well.

There comes a time in every mans’ life where he must do something he does not want to do. Standing in line at the cinemas the day the Sex and the City movie was released is one of those times. Yet boyfriends make up over a quarter of chick flick audiences. But as any female would know, it’s an issue dragging him along. So I decided to compile a little list of things that made the whole thing easier from my 3 and a bit years experience of having to accompany Jess to the occasional romantic comedy.

1. Hugh Grant = good and Matthew McConaughey = bad.
   Hugh Grant is actually pretty funny. And a lot less physically emasculating than Matthew McConaughey.
   Whereas anything Matthew McConaughey says is just an excuse to take his shirt off. Not exactly what I look forward to in a movie.
2. Always play classical music when you go to sleep. Just trust me, it was the best thing my parents ever did. It will classically condition you to fall asleep whenever you hear orchestral music. Which just happens to be the music of choice for the final climatic soppy love scene. Thanks to this, I’m usually asleep at this point.  That way you’re awake for the racier parts of the film, and snoozing for the soppy bits.
   
3. If you’re really scraping for brownie points with the missus, rent Love Actually. For one it’s a lot more bearable than any American chick flick, for the most part because of it’s humour. Also it’s got Hugh Grant, and no Matthew McConaughey, which reinforces point 1.
   
4. As Jerry Seinfeld once observed, men will sit through anything, no matter how mundane, if there is even the slightest chance of seeing breasts (e.g. Rochelle Rochelle). So advice here, steer clear of PG romantic comedies.
5. Learn to bargain. I’ll see Confessions of a Shopaholic with you, if you see Tron with me. At least you get something out of it, even if it means you have to pay to take her to the movies a second time.
6. The Philip-Eclipse rule. While not specific to romantic comedies, it definitely applies. If you at attending a movie targeted at women (e.g. romantic comedies) with friends, then the ratio of males to females must not exceed 1:1. Otherwise it just looks creepy at the ticket counter. As the rule name suggests, I was almost denied being able to see Eclipse by Philip because of this rule.