On Me, On What I Stand For, On The Internet, On My Break

Why howdy howdy there, Internet People, and a little how-do-you-do, too. I'm fairly chipper, today, as you can no-doubt tell, for virtually no reason other than that I managed to get a decent, uninterrupted sleep last night. No loud noises waking me up, no nightmares disturbing my slumber, no random texts to burst my sleep-bubble. Nothing. Truly, it was just pure bliss. And because of this, I'm going to gift to you two blog posts today! Are you not lucky? I mean, sure, you could look at it as my attempt to reconcile the fact that I didn't post last night because I was too busy learning how to sew, but where will that get you? No-where! And it certainly won't make it seem like I'm exceedingly generous and am giving you all a nice little gift.

Today's first post comes from a posting made on the forums over at 20sb, which suggested (well, it almost demanded, but that was the point of the thread...) that I do an "about me" post, so that people knew the person behind the ramblings behind the blog. To this end, I have gone about asking various people for questions that they want me to answer, and (in some kind of crazy anti-personal-privacy moment) I am about to attempt to answer them all. Before this, however, I should give you a little bit of background.

If Only I'd Found This Gif Sooner...

My name is (for the purposes of this blog, and a large chunk of my actual life) Tiger - whilst I'm not displeased with my birth name, various people didn't think it suited me, and decided that Tiger suited me better, and from the seed of one well chosen MSN avatar (see above) and the twisted words of my friend Emz, came the moniker by which I am now widely known. I am, at the time of writing this, 24 years old. I live in Bathurst, Australia (a relatively small city, known primarily for the Mt Panorama race track, and - I guess - Charles Sturt University), and I am employed at the university here as an applications developer.

I tend to split my days into thirds. The first third is spent at work, attempting to upgrade programs so that they are more useful to the administrative staff, and just making them generally more awesome than anybody could ever imagine. The second third is spent sleeping (well, it's roughly a third - if I can get 8 hours sleep I'm generally pretty happy...) which isn't too exciting, but by gum it feels good. The final (see what I didn't do there) third is generally spent hanging out with my friends Spud, Encey, Squiggles, Elmo, and Emma - recently Kylie has been hanging out with us a lot more, too, which is awesome, and now that X-Man and is back from Sydney, I imagine he'll spend some time at my place for D&D games. So now that the background is out of the way, I guess I'll just get on to everybody's questions!

R...Rawr: "Christian Bale is having one of his epic rages about 5 meters away, what do you do?"

Well, Rawr, in a situation like that one I'd probably do one of two things. I like to think that I'd have the guts to walk up to him and, in a calm manner, ask him just who he thinks he is. Just because he's Christian Bale, does that suddenly mean that he's better than everybody else? Does it give him the right to bully those who earn less than he does? "You're just an actor, Mr. Bale..." I'd say, "Dime a dozen. What you do has no substance, no real merit. Were you to retire tomorrow, you couldn't say that you've made a positive and lasting effect on the world, and honestly believe it - without being terrifically conceited, that is. I mean, I know that I'm just a programmer - I'm neither a doctor, nor a teacher. I don't put out fires. I don't take care of people who can't look after themselves. But I least I know that my work is relatively asinine. Fuck you, Christian Bale."

I would like to think that I'd have the guts to say that, but I know that I don't. It is a shame.

Shibby: What is your favourite book in the whole universe, and why?

My favourite book, in the whole universe, would have to be Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass, And What Alice Found There, both by Lewis Carroll, read back-to-back. These books hold such amazing memories for me that picking them up, and indeed just thinking about them, makes me feel at ease. Each time I read them, I discover something new the Charles slipped into his work that I had previously missed - a new mathematical oddity, a new lexical quandary, a new piece of gibberish to use. I simply do not tire of this story. It is, for me, the epitome of fantasy - a journey to a magical land filled with excitement, and adventure. The stories have excellent morals, they are brilliantly written, and the plot never ceases to fill me with joyous goo.

Amanda @ LongRoadSet: Why is the sky blue?

The sky is blue due to a principle called Rayleigh Scattering. Basically, what happens is that, as the light from the sun passes through the molecules that make up the air/ozone/whatever, the blue frequencies are absorbed and "thrown" in a whole bunch of different directions. The other frequencies get absorbed as well, but not nearly as much, and they tend to just get thrown in the direction they were coming from. That's also the reason that sunsets go that really pretty colour.

Gary: Where do you see yourself in 5 years time?

I would love to have opened my arcade in five years time. Whether that happens in Australia, or in England (around my wonderful England friends whom I miss terrifically...) is yet to be determined. It all depends on whether Birmingham has a greater call for arcades than Bathurst. Also, it depends on my funds. Oh, but then I don't want to leave Spud, so he and Encey would have to come to England with me - as would Squiggles and Emma. Elmo could come, but I don't think he enjoys the English very much.

I do see myself continuing this blog, however, for quite some time - I hope to still be writing for it in five years, and I hope that you guys are still enjoying it well after then. I mostly see myself surrounded by loved ones, and having a great time

Cheva: UUUUUummmmm...'What is your favourite type of pasta?'

Well, I was going to answer "Ramen" to this question, because I flipping adore ramen, but then Cheva told me that no, noodles do not count when selecting a pasta. If this is really the case (but I have my doubts - ramen should be allowed to be my favourite everything) then I guess I'd have to say lasagna. It was a pretty tough decision for me, this one, not because I particularly have an affinity with multiple pasta varieties, but because the thought of it actually tends to put me off my meals a little bit...So I'm going to stick with ramen, instead.

X-Man: How about...um...'Have you ever cause damage to property during sexual intercourse?'

Yes. I've accidentally broken part of a university bed because of the way we used the rope. Is that what you wanted to hear?

Chrisopha: Why did you start a blog and is the reason the same now? 

I started my blog to document my challenge to finish 100 lists of 100 things to do - a noble cause, I suppose, but not one that lasted very long...I soon realised that, even if I did something every day it would still take me until about age 40 to complete the challenge - and there was no way I was doing a thing every day.

I'm much more fond of what I use the blog for now, and I think that it really has started to take on good shape and life.

Spud: Let me ask you and forgive me if this seems like a naive question, but 'What is you favorite type of cake and why?'

My favourite kind of cake would definitely have to be chocolate bavarian...No wait - dark chocolate cheesecake...But then, lemon meringue pie is really good too (does that count as cake?) Basically, I love pretty much any baked dessert, as long as it doesn't really contain any huge chunks of fruit. Huge chunks of chocolate, on the other hand, are perfectly acceptable...There is no why...Only cake...

Colm: Do you share an affinity with any kind of ancient god?

Not really...I mean, I kind of like the idea of Bacchus/Dionysus, but then I don't like to drink (I just like the whole free-spirit thing...) And Hermes is pretty awesome. Loki would be cool if he weren't such a colossal jerk (but that's part of his charm, too, I guess...) Hmm - I'm not really sure...I don't think so. I can't pick one, anyway.