I love wind. I mean, I really love wind. The feel of it against the face, drowning everything out til it's hard to breathe - mmhmm, just great. I love water. After all, I used to train as a swimmer and was even school's best swimmer - splitting with a good friend of mine, but meh. Always best to say "best", since if you don't compliment yourself, chances are, no-one will. Water's great. Rains, too. And snow, of course - which brings me to another point - I like a decent chill. Of course, being dressed appropriately for it.
Why did I just say all that? Well, mostly because when you combine all those together - sans the snow - you get a situation that's the sum of all with a minus sign in front. A very fat minus. After another lovely night shift, I just ended up in a storm. Very cold and very wet and very windy storm. In just about five minutes, there's not been a single dry thread on me - a wonder the telephone seems to be working alright, looks like it wasn't made by a summer employee. But anyway - it's been rather an interesting walk - twenty minutes in a driving rain. I think that the least thing I will be getting out of it is a flu that I just managed to convince not being the right target for (thank you, sick people at the factory! I always enjoy coughing for several weeks, donations of medicine-resistant strains are especially welcome!).
Furthermore, I am now in possession of a pair of jeans that literally has swamps in its pockets - well, lakes, rather, but regardlessly, the damned thing is now unwearable at least until it dries off, and I think it needs a good wash, as well. And the weather is promised to continue in the same key for several days, oh the joy.
So, to prevent potential disease and for falling asleep easier, I've actually taken a nice shot of gin from my emergency gin & tonic stash. Ew. I really hate hard liquor. Really, really hate it and what it generally makes of people. Long story. I also fail to understand how the hell people actually drink it. It tastes horrible.
*sigh* Ah well, sleep time, I guess.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Sunday, July 29, 2007
On Electronic Addictions
This is a placeholder, of sorts, to a tomorrow's editing of the conversation I am cutting this out from. The subject is basically how World of Warcraft creates an addiction-type effect.
Ever noticed, for one, that WoW is full of triangular shapes and upward-directed lines? As well as squares, which aren't uncommon? I'll try to find that triangle article stuff later, however, in the analysis of pictures in children's books, it's very commonly taken to analyse the shapes that the pictures have. It basically boils down to the fact that upward triangles are very strongly positive, downward triangles are negative, squares are pretty much "stable" positions, lines going up from left to right are positive, the other way around is "negative"
Furthermore, there's the size. The stuff around is generally larger than the avatars. Except the "significant" stuff like houses and carts that are out of proportion. Plus, there's the colours. Colours are all "full", "bright" and "colourful"
All these three features are QUITE common to what kids that can draw would draw. I mean - objects that kids draw are usually outta proportion. A toy car would be huge, while a house would be small
So, basically, the WoW imagery is aiming at the so-called "inner child", which reverts to childhood, which is omg carefree awesome time, which is something most would like to go back to - and therefore the subconscious addiction
Ever noticed, for one, that WoW is full of triangular shapes and upward-directed lines? As well as squares, which aren't uncommon? I'll try to find that triangle article stuff later, however, in the analysis of pictures in children's books, it's very commonly taken to analyse the shapes that the pictures have. It basically boils down to the fact that upward triangles are very strongly positive, downward triangles are negative, squares are pretty much "stable" positions, lines going up from left to right are positive, the other way around is "negative"
Furthermore, there's the size. The stuff around is generally larger than the avatars. Except the "significant" stuff like houses and carts that are out of proportion. Plus, there's the colours. Colours are all "full", "bright" and "colourful"
All these three features are QUITE common to what kids that can draw would draw. I mean - objects that kids draw are usually outta proportion. A toy car would be huge, while a house would be small
So, basically, the WoW imagery is aiming at the so-called "inner child", which reverts to childhood, which is omg carefree awesome time, which is something most would like to go back to - and therefore the subconscious addiction
Child exploitation
Today I decided to write on a serious and non-fictional matter for some reason. Possibly to counter the hilarity that Simpsons: The Movie is. In any case... The topic is child exploitation.
And no, I'm not going to talk about African child soldiers. Or about South America's field-working kids. Or Asian sweatshop workers. Or even the good old times when all good children of England worked as chimney sweeps (and got stuck in the chimneys and died - which is true) or factory and coal mine workers. I'm going to talk about our own democratic etc society.
First of all, I would like to point to the following picture. What do we see? We see a young African boy, looking sad and serious. Now, if we look at majority of UNICEF pictures, what we see is similar imagery - sad and serious children. Occasionally, it's a happy child (To show the help UNICEF provides) or a woman. One nearly never sees an adult male in the picture. While this is clear sexism, the point is in the following fact - by "following the call of your heart", which these pictures evoke, you essentially condone exploitation of children and women.
Why so? Well, first of all, the images are used to manipulate - quite well so - the viewer into sympathy. We don't know the background of the kid, but we presume he's sad over not having eaten for ten days, having little water, no education and so forth. The woman on the picture will, of course, mean powerlessness in the male-dominated world, lack of career, education and freedom (Undeniably, this is too much so in many cases, but that is besides the point). The picture furthermore draws on either parental feelings or feelings of compassion/solidarity/generosity or, most importantly, guilt. I mean, you can't let a child starve, can you? Tsk, tsk, heartless you for passing by such a picture without signing up as a benefactor.
But now, let's think about it. These children, do they know and fully understand the purpose of being taken pictures of? That they will be used to trick money out of people for what the benefactors call "saving their people" or whatnot? Do they fully approve the fact that millions of people will see it and give their money just because of the sad look upon a child's face rather than studying the facts and doing charity out of their own premeditated decision? This is no better than someone begging at the street by lying that they're blind, out of place to live and will have a foot amputation tomorrow. It is a manipulation and a lie.
But in fact, a lot of manipulations are based on children - or women. Considering the age we're supposedly living in, it is odd, to say the least. Have you ever heard the phrase, "But think of all the children!"? Well, how about thinking of all their parents, or people that can as easily make children as well? Like, how about thinking of "the people"? But nah, people are already grown up, they aren't helpless, they can stand up for themselves. Right? So let's use the "children" card again, since they're the flowers of the future and so on - a better, more enlightened us. If this isn't exploiting a child, I don't quite know what is. This isn't even exploiting the child physically, this is exploiting on an ideological level - in order to get your agenda through. UNICEF uses kids to get cash to presumeably save the world, Mattel uses kids to gain millions in Barbie sales (what good parent can refuse a crying child a new, shiny, lovely toy?), some governmental official uses the phrase to carpet-bomb a minor third-world country... Doing it all for the kids.
Don't get me wrong, I like kids just as much as any normal person does. Besides, as our Literature teacher Lidya says, children are people. There's the good, the bad, the ugly. One can't like all people, same way, one can't like all children, either.
It's just that I like them enough to not like having them used.
And no, I'm not going to talk about African child soldiers. Or about South America's field-working kids. Or Asian sweatshop workers. Or even the good old times when all good children of England worked as chimney sweeps (and got stuck in the chimneys and died - which is true) or factory and coal mine workers. I'm going to talk about our own democratic etc society.
First of all, I would like to point to the following picture. What do we see? We see a young African boy, looking sad and serious. Now, if we look at majority of UNICEF pictures, what we see is similar imagery - sad and serious children. Occasionally, it's a happy child (To show the help UNICEF provides) or a woman. One nearly never sees an adult male in the picture. While this is clear sexism, the point is in the following fact - by "following the call of your heart", which these pictures evoke, you essentially condone exploitation of children and women.
Why so? Well, first of all, the images are used to manipulate - quite well so - the viewer into sympathy. We don't know the background of the kid, but we presume he's sad over not having eaten for ten days, having little water, no education and so forth. The woman on the picture will, of course, mean powerlessness in the male-dominated world, lack of career, education and freedom (Undeniably, this is too much so in many cases, but that is besides the point). The picture furthermore draws on either parental feelings or feelings of compassion/solidarity/generosity or, most importantly, guilt. I mean, you can't let a child starve, can you? Tsk, tsk, heartless you for passing by such a picture without signing up as a benefactor.
But now, let's think about it. These children, do they know and fully understand the purpose of being taken pictures of? That they will be used to trick money out of people for what the benefactors call "saving their people" or whatnot? Do they fully approve the fact that millions of people will see it and give their money just because of the sad look upon a child's face rather than studying the facts and doing charity out of their own premeditated decision? This is no better than someone begging at the street by lying that they're blind, out of place to live and will have a foot amputation tomorrow. It is a manipulation and a lie.
But in fact, a lot of manipulations are based on children - or women. Considering the age we're supposedly living in, it is odd, to say the least. Have you ever heard the phrase, "But think of all the children!"? Well, how about thinking of all their parents, or people that can as easily make children as well? Like, how about thinking of "the people"? But nah, people are already grown up, they aren't helpless, they can stand up for themselves. Right? So let's use the "children" card again, since they're the flowers of the future and so on - a better, more enlightened us. If this isn't exploiting a child, I don't quite know what is. This isn't even exploiting the child physically, this is exploiting on an ideological level - in order to get your agenda through. UNICEF uses kids to get cash to presumeably save the world, Mattel uses kids to gain millions in Barbie sales (what good parent can refuse a crying child a new, shiny, lovely toy?), some governmental official uses the phrase to carpet-bomb a minor third-world country... Doing it all for the kids.
Don't get me wrong, I like kids just as much as any normal person does. Besides, as our Literature teacher Lidya says, children are people. There's the good, the bad, the ugly. One can't like all people, same way, one can't like all children, either.
It's just that I like them enough to not like having them used.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Promo: Kamelot/Ghost Opera
Omigosh, Kamelot releases a new album (Ghost Opera)! I must say that this is rather exciting and something I looked forward to for ages (since release of the previous album in 2005, but it's more dramatic that way).
For those that aren't familiar with the band, here's a few samples of their older tracks from Youtube (and I would recommend minimizing the window and just listening to the music, since the bloody kids make fanboy/girl videoes by slapping together some piece of anime and the song. Grrrrrr. Ah well, got to thank them for at least having the songs there)
Temples of Gold, one of the earlier ballads - and a really good one at that. Karma album
Wander, one of the ballads from the Epica album. Another of my favourites.
The Haunting, a track from Black Halo, last year's album. This one actually has original video by Kamelot so it's watchable.
Soul Society, track that follows The Haunting on Black Halo album.
Abandoned, Black Halo's only ballad. A very good one as well, though.
Ah, must get, must get.
Edit/add: Eeep. Dark, dark album. Pretty song though - Love You To Death. *shiver* Not sure what to say about it.
Note: All links go to Youtube, no downloads beyond the normal Youtube loadings necessary.
For those that aren't familiar with the band, here's a few samples of their older tracks from Youtube (and I would recommend minimizing the window and just listening to the music, since the bloody kids make fanboy/girl videoes by slapping together some piece of anime and the song. Grrrrrr. Ah well, got to thank them for at least having the songs there)
Temples of Gold, one of the earlier ballads - and a really good one at that. Karma album
Wander, one of the ballads from the Epica album. Another of my favourites.
The Haunting, a track from Black Halo, last year's album. This one actually has original video by Kamelot so it's watchable.
Soul Society, track that follows The Haunting on Black Halo album.
Abandoned, Black Halo's only ballad. A very good one as well, though.
Ah, must get, must get.
Edit/add: Eeep. Dark, dark album. Pretty song though - Love You To Death. *shiver* Not sure what to say about it.
Note: All links go to Youtube, no downloads beyond the normal Youtube loadings necessary.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Rants: On the lovely word "Freedom"
Well, then, that's final - I had enough with the said word. It pours down the pages of every magazine, drops out of the TV screens and floods out of the radio. Really, it's even a good tone to have the word appear on various webpages in various contexts. It's the new - well, a little old now - hip word. And where, then, might I ask, is the actual freedom attached to the word? Where's the freedom of choice, morality, action, word, preference? What we're given to look at and perform is nowhere near the actual freedom, which, in essence, would count as a perhaps somewhat more ordered version of anarchy. But even if we ignore the implications that the word freedom gives (thank you, Merriam-Webster), we do not even have the basic freedoms that the democracy is meant to offer. Everything is restricted and constrained, everything has limits, buts and strings attached. In essence, being free either means possessing vast riches or wielding enormous power. Which, I'm pretty sure, about 98-99 percent of the global population do not have. Another option is living as a hermit or a nomad - or somewhere in Siberia, where other people might appear once in ten years to ask for direction to somewhere where people actually live.
The pretty word, this "freedom" is merely a nice-sounding concept that the governments and the corporations are using to goad people into complacency and illusion of happiness and self-importance. But to be quite honest and frank, unless you have wealth, fame or power, you're not going to influence anything. Anything on the major scale that doesn't regard cosmetic difference, in any case - unless a whole great body of nobodies actually decides to have had enough and displays it accordingly - either by a dramatic vote change, or by the much more violent means of revolution. And to be quite honest again, neither is going to change anything, either - the candidates are pre-picked and the leaders of the revolution are not idiots.
So... When people like G.W. Bush or some "liberal" press representative gives nice phrases about freedom and liberty, I feel more and more like gnashing my teeth. It may have once meant something. Today, its value is so low, it won't get you even a piece of bread.
The pretty word, this "freedom" is merely a nice-sounding concept that the governments and the corporations are using to goad people into complacency and illusion of happiness and self-importance. But to be quite honest and frank, unless you have wealth, fame or power, you're not going to influence anything. Anything on the major scale that doesn't regard cosmetic difference, in any case - unless a whole great body of nobodies actually decides to have had enough and displays it accordingly - either by a dramatic vote change, or by the much more violent means of revolution. And to be quite honest again, neither is going to change anything, either - the candidates are pre-picked and the leaders of the revolution are not idiots.
So... When people like G.W. Bush or some "liberal" press representative gives nice phrases about freedom and liberty, I feel more and more like gnashing my teeth. It may have once meant something. Today, its value is so low, it won't get you even a piece of bread.
Monday, July 9, 2007
Factory Stories, Part 1 remade
Albert, part 1.
The work he had to do wasn't really something he could actually call "work" in the real sense of the word. Not that he minded, it certainly was beating the hell out of flipping burgers at a night grill stand like he had done for his last summer holiday. Now, three weeks into his employment term, he found himself oddly at ease with the surroundings - the giant whirring hangar he worked in, the grayness of the surroundings, the tired faces - well, he was one of them now, so he couldn't really say he stood out of the crowd. Sure, there were people that acted differently - like the fellow that always showed up wearing black clothes and a sarcastic smile on his face - Albert could swear he heard laughter from that particular part of the building. The guy made him laugh a few times as well, throwing around several dry sarcastic comments. Then again. Albert liked the silence. All they had to do was pack the ready radios, and packing was what he did. The people that populated his cubicle were nice, quiet people that seemed to share a few common interests but never really talked about them a great deal - which was good, too, as he really couldn't care for what they did. Or, he couldn't really say he couldn't care at all, rather, he preferred to simply work without getting any kinds of attachments formed. To Albert, working at the factory was merely a way to earn his money, not a visit to a concert hall or a beach - he didn't have to enjoy it, and the fact that he didn't hate it was a great bonus.
"Number sixteen-oh-one!" Albert snapped out of his thoughts, finishing the packing of a yet another box. "Yes?"
"You get to move to another part of the factory. Sorry, necessary measures, really - the management thinks you need to learn some other things around"
Albert nodded, getting up from his seat. Learning new things, now that was something he didn't enjoy. What was this about? He fulfilled the daily quota every day, even did extra sometimes, there were rarely any complaints about his packing, and he even received some faint praise from the colleagues. So why now? And where? And what? He sighed quietly as he followed the man that came after him - another typical factory employee. Sometimes they looked like twins, and this was one of those times. Lab coats, those odd hats some wore... Ugh, he would have to wear one of those too? Seemed so - the man, babbling on, passed him a light plastic hat and showed him a whole shelf filled with more of such. Albert nodded politely, pretending to listen, as he put the hat on. At least they weren't re- useable. He'd hate it if they were. Someone else's hair in his hat, what next, lice?
While he inwardly cursed, they crossed another magnificent grey concrete hall and entered a maze of cubicles. "You'll be putting these things together now, sixteen-oh-one. The people around will show you how to do it, it's really nothing difficult. Well, good luck at the new place!" The man walked away, leaving Albert in front of an enterance to one of the cubicles. Albert sighed and hesitantly stepped inside, instantly wishing he hadn't. The inhabitants, oh god. The inhabitants reminded him of the clients he used to have at the burger joint - two haggardly, foul-smelling men of unknown age or origin and a woman that could have easily been used to sweep chimneys - both for the reasons of her terrible, sickly, unnatural thinness and for what seemed to be unremovable stains on her face. Then again, she might have simply liked to drink a tad too much. The jolly company waved to Albert, the woman instinctively fixing the plastic hat on her head. "I hope I wouldn't have to work here too long", Albert thought.
It only took him a few hours to learn more about his new neighbours than he's ever known of his old ones. He couldn't quite say he liked what he'd have learned, either, though most of the things he'd now heard from his "comrades" merely confirmed his worst suspicions. In other words, they were drunkards of the worst sort - not quite something he'd personally enjoyed. In fact, drunkards and addicts were the facts that he had violently tried to hide about his family.
Well, not all his family, of course. His brother, mostly, the drug addict that kept getting busted at minor theft attempts yet always managed to get money for another dose from somewhere. Albert didn't quite think he wanted to know how exactly his brother, the most inept and clumsy thief in history, was earning his money. Then there was the father, a quiet drunkard with endless sorrow in his eyes, the sort that will point out all the troubles that plague the world but never get off his arse to stop spending his wife's salary and actually work. Oh, he had reasons, of course, thousands of them. Albert wondered how his mother was putting up with the old git. He moved out of the mutual family home as soon as he could, though, so it was really no trouble of his any longer - mother didn't want to move out and leave the useless waste of flesh that were the other males of his family behind - and he didn't feel inclined to try to persuade her otherwise. Still, having such characters in his past was one thing, sharing the same breathing space with three of them at work, eight hours each day was a different matter completely. Their breath, their faces, their voices... He could barely contain his disgust. That, and the subjects they picked, things that sometimes made his skin crawl. Sure, the discussions of the latest drunken party were still manageable, as well as comparing of one sort of cheap booze against another, but then, the woman would open her mouth. The horrible, disgusting, revolting woman. Sometimes, he wished he could hit her with something heavy, or stab her with something sharp, or just beat her face to a pulp - well, judging by her face, someone with less self-control than himself had already done it, and perhaps more than once. Albert mentally applauded to whoever it was that did it, wishing he'd have been there to watch. But all that aside... Why? How? How could this woman find people to mate with so she could tell stories of it the next day? Did she pay them? Was there someone that desperate? Or that drunk? Albert wasn't sure there was enough alcohol one could consume before the standards would drop that low. She ranted on and on, though, describing everything down to every detail, and the men seemed to at least approve what they were hearing. The first and only feeble attempt by Albert to make the woman stop was interrupted by them immediately, he was called a chauvinist and an ass as well as a number of other things, and for at least a week, the dirty trio would occasionally make up a crude joke about him.
He even tried to talk about it to their foreman - to no use. The foreman of this particular spot of hell seemed to be a hard-headed idiot that was beating his head against a brick wall daily in order not to lose his admirable qualities. All Albert got out of the discussion was that trying to "talk behind your comrades' backs" was bad, and that he should "try to get used to them". Well, that wasn't true. He also got the foreman to send him and the other three to a bar, with several free drinks on him. Him being Albert, of course, for being such an ass to his "friends" and trying to deteriorate the workplace morale. What morale? A rotting corpse had more morale than Albert's damned cubicle. As he stepped outside the foreman's office, Albert felt blood rushing to his face. How dare he tell him such filth? He had the nerve to threaten to fire him with a letter of warning to any other company he was ever to join as a disruptor and anarchist if he didn't follow the order of taking those three to a bar. What the hell was wrong with that man, anyway? People usually preferred it when their employees did not drink, rather than have that in reverse. Albert clenched his jaw. Fine, he would take them to drink. And he would sit quietly for another week. But then, he'd definitely be out of this hole, away from drunks, idiots and harlots. He closed his eyes then, just for a moment.
And just in that moment, he must have finally snapped, as when he opened them, he saw a squirrel. A rather large squirrel with a fat tail. Just sitting in the middle of the hall, staring at him square in the eyes. He blinked several times, wondering if the squirrel would just go away. But it just didn't, rather, it moved a bit closer, almost to within his reach now, squeaking at him quietly. Albert instinctively reached for his pocket, wondering if it contained any food he could offer to the little critter. But just as he reached for the pocket, taking his eyes off the squirrel, it vanished. Albert sighed and shook his head. Perhaps that idea of having the drinks wasn't so bad after all, what with seeing squirrels in the middle of a bloody factory.
...Or perhaps it wasn't. The place the drunks picked was full of derelict charm, dirty, noisy and smelly - and naturally, filled with more of the type that Albert wanted to avoid. He began to wonder if such bars were left around to make people to appreciate the averageness of other places, or whether they actually were breeding places for their customers. Then he recalled the daily talks of the woman and shuddered. Of course it was. He sighed and ordered the drinks, deciding to empty a few quickly to slightly dullen the perception.
Perhaps it wasn't such a good idea. Or maybe it was! He'd forgotten how little it took for him to get drunk and lose his stupid attitudes towards everyone and everything. The workmates didn't look at all as bad as he'd made them look to himself before, just some slightly less fortunate folk that ended up on the wrong side of the tracks and couldn't help get across, being tossed back to their place by the likes of him. How could he be so stuck-up? Albert was briefly shocked with himself, but another drink quickly solved that, leaving him to joyfully perform at the karaoke machine. His new friends looked at him approvingly, occasionally, even seeming to try to slow him down, but he couldn't be stopped, not by them, not by anyone. He had money to burn, for why have money if it can't be burned? He seemed to remember heading off to another bar with his friends, though then again, he might have been wrong. To be quite honest, now that he just woke up to the ringing of alarm clock and aching of the head, he wasn't quite sure what had happened last night. Didn't seem too awful, though, going to a bar with those three. They sure knew how to have fun. Such were Albert's thoughts as he gathered himself for work.
His thoughts were still a mess when he entered the factory and headed towards his cubicle. Just at the door of it, he stopped, trying to gather his slightly crumbling mind and thinking of what to say to the neighbours, when he suddenly heard their voices from the inside. They were exceptionally early today, all of them. And they seemed to speak of him - a subject he could listen in on for a few moments - and so he stayed. And as he listened on, his eyes grew wider and wider in horror and disgust, mind conjuring images from its depths, and those were not happy images. Well, not now that he was sober. That woman, that dirty, terrible, horrible woman, how could she? How could he? He couldn't have been that drunk! No, this was a mistake, a lie, slander, that's what it was! All lies, and she was spreading them behind his back!
As the thoughts and blood filled Albert's head, his vision dimmed for a moment, his head strangely like a balloon, empty and light. Slowly, a smile instilled itself on his lips, a smile that didn't apply to his eyes in the least. He tore himself away from where he stood and entered the cubicle, quietly greeting everyone and leaning downwards to pick up the materials for the upcoming day. The group seemed to pay little heed of him - even the woman, who continued her ugly storytelling, likely thinking he would approve or enjoy it. Well, silly her.
With that thought, Albert picked up a radio cover and took a swift leap towards the woman. She stared at him, startled, words about to drop off her tongue, as he swung the cover in the air briefly and applied it to her face. Something inside him screeched, trying to stop him, but either it didn't try hard enough, or he was a bit too absorbed in his new, and rather pleasant occupation. Either way, his hands kept moving, blows falling to anything he'd meet in his way. Suddenly, something hit him from behind. It didn't feel like much, but now, his legs could no longer support him, the body won't listen, or even feel. Faced with no other choice, he fell to the ground - facing the monster of a woman just in front of him. He didn't quite know what made him feel so sure of it, but as he looked at her glassy eyes, it dawned upon him that the woman would never again open that stupid dirty mouth. With that, he smiled and closed his eyes.
Commentary: For coherence's sake.
Commentary 2: Same reasons, ending modified.
The work he had to do wasn't really something he could actually call "work" in the real sense of the word. Not that he minded, it certainly was beating the hell out of flipping burgers at a night grill stand like he had done for his last summer holiday. Now, three weeks into his employment term, he found himself oddly at ease with the surroundings - the giant whirring hangar he worked in, the grayness of the surroundings, the tired faces - well, he was one of them now, so he couldn't really say he stood out of the crowd. Sure, there were people that acted differently - like the fellow that always showed up wearing black clothes and a sarcastic smile on his face - Albert could swear he heard laughter from that particular part of the building. The guy made him laugh a few times as well, throwing around several dry sarcastic comments. Then again. Albert liked the silence. All they had to do was pack the ready radios, and packing was what he did. The people that populated his cubicle were nice, quiet people that seemed to share a few common interests but never really talked about them a great deal - which was good, too, as he really couldn't care for what they did. Or, he couldn't really say he couldn't care at all, rather, he preferred to simply work without getting any kinds of attachments formed. To Albert, working at the factory was merely a way to earn his money, not a visit to a concert hall or a beach - he didn't have to enjoy it, and the fact that he didn't hate it was a great bonus.
"Number sixteen-oh-one!" Albert snapped out of his thoughts, finishing the packing of a yet another box. "Yes?"
"You get to move to another part of the factory. Sorry, necessary measures, really - the management thinks you need to learn some other things around"
Albert nodded, getting up from his seat. Learning new things, now that was something he didn't enjoy. What was this about? He fulfilled the daily quota every day, even did extra sometimes, there were rarely any complaints about his packing, and he even received some faint praise from the colleagues. So why now? And where? And what? He sighed quietly as he followed the man that came after him - another typical factory employee. Sometimes they looked like twins, and this was one of those times. Lab coats, those odd hats some wore... Ugh, he would have to wear one of those too? Seemed so - the man, babbling on, passed him a light plastic hat and showed him a whole shelf filled with more of such. Albert nodded politely, pretending to listen, as he put the hat on. At least they weren't re- useable. He'd hate it if they were. Someone else's hair in his hat, what next, lice?
While he inwardly cursed, they crossed another magnificent grey concrete hall and entered a maze of cubicles. "You'll be putting these things together now, sixteen-oh-one. The people around will show you how to do it, it's really nothing difficult. Well, good luck at the new place!" The man walked away, leaving Albert in front of an enterance to one of the cubicles. Albert sighed and hesitantly stepped inside, instantly wishing he hadn't. The inhabitants, oh god. The inhabitants reminded him of the clients he used to have at the burger joint - two haggardly, foul-smelling men of unknown age or origin and a woman that could have easily been used to sweep chimneys - both for the reasons of her terrible, sickly, unnatural thinness and for what seemed to be unremovable stains on her face. Then again, she might have simply liked to drink a tad too much. The jolly company waved to Albert, the woman instinctively fixing the plastic hat on her head. "I hope I wouldn't have to work here too long", Albert thought.
It only took him a few hours to learn more about his new neighbours than he's ever known of his old ones. He couldn't quite say he liked what he'd have learned, either, though most of the things he'd now heard from his "comrades" merely confirmed his worst suspicions. In other words, they were drunkards of the worst sort - not quite something he'd personally enjoyed. In fact, drunkards and addicts were the facts that he had violently tried to hide about his family.
Well, not all his family, of course. His brother, mostly, the drug addict that kept getting busted at minor theft attempts yet always managed to get money for another dose from somewhere. Albert didn't quite think he wanted to know how exactly his brother, the most inept and clumsy thief in history, was earning his money. Then there was the father, a quiet drunkard with endless sorrow in his eyes, the sort that will point out all the troubles that plague the world but never get off his arse to stop spending his wife's salary and actually work. Oh, he had reasons, of course, thousands of them. Albert wondered how his mother was putting up with the old git. He moved out of the mutual family home as soon as he could, though, so it was really no trouble of his any longer - mother didn't want to move out and leave the useless waste of flesh that were the other males of his family behind - and he didn't feel inclined to try to persuade her otherwise. Still, having such characters in his past was one thing, sharing the same breathing space with three of them at work, eight hours each day was a different matter completely. Their breath, their faces, their voices... He could barely contain his disgust. That, and the subjects they picked, things that sometimes made his skin crawl. Sure, the discussions of the latest drunken party were still manageable, as well as comparing of one sort of cheap booze against another, but then, the woman would open her mouth. The horrible, disgusting, revolting woman. Sometimes, he wished he could hit her with something heavy, or stab her with something sharp, or just beat her face to a pulp - well, judging by her face, someone with less self-control than himself had already done it, and perhaps more than once. Albert mentally applauded to whoever it was that did it, wishing he'd have been there to watch. But all that aside... Why? How? How could this woman find people to mate with so she could tell stories of it the next day? Did she pay them? Was there someone that desperate? Or that drunk? Albert wasn't sure there was enough alcohol one could consume before the standards would drop that low. She ranted on and on, though, describing everything down to every detail, and the men seemed to at least approve what they were hearing. The first and only feeble attempt by Albert to make the woman stop was interrupted by them immediately, he was called a chauvinist and an ass as well as a number of other things, and for at least a week, the dirty trio would occasionally make up a crude joke about him.
He even tried to talk about it to their foreman - to no use. The foreman of this particular spot of hell seemed to be a hard-headed idiot that was beating his head against a brick wall daily in order not to lose his admirable qualities. All Albert got out of the discussion was that trying to "talk behind your comrades' backs" was bad, and that he should "try to get used to them". Well, that wasn't true. He also got the foreman to send him and the other three to a bar, with several free drinks on him. Him being Albert, of course, for being such an ass to his "friends" and trying to deteriorate the workplace morale. What morale? A rotting corpse had more morale than Albert's damned cubicle. As he stepped outside the foreman's office, Albert felt blood rushing to his face. How dare he tell him such filth? He had the nerve to threaten to fire him with a letter of warning to any other company he was ever to join as a disruptor and anarchist if he didn't follow the order of taking those three to a bar. What the hell was wrong with that man, anyway? People usually preferred it when their employees did not drink, rather than have that in reverse. Albert clenched his jaw. Fine, he would take them to drink. And he would sit quietly for another week. But then, he'd definitely be out of this hole, away from drunks, idiots and harlots. He closed his eyes then, just for a moment.
And just in that moment, he must have finally snapped, as when he opened them, he saw a squirrel. A rather large squirrel with a fat tail. Just sitting in the middle of the hall, staring at him square in the eyes. He blinked several times, wondering if the squirrel would just go away. But it just didn't, rather, it moved a bit closer, almost to within his reach now, squeaking at him quietly. Albert instinctively reached for his pocket, wondering if it contained any food he could offer to the little critter. But just as he reached for the pocket, taking his eyes off the squirrel, it vanished. Albert sighed and shook his head. Perhaps that idea of having the drinks wasn't so bad after all, what with seeing squirrels in the middle of a bloody factory.
...Or perhaps it wasn't. The place the drunks picked was full of derelict charm, dirty, noisy and smelly - and naturally, filled with more of the type that Albert wanted to avoid. He began to wonder if such bars were left around to make people to appreciate the averageness of other places, or whether they actually were breeding places for their customers. Then he recalled the daily talks of the woman and shuddered. Of course it was. He sighed and ordered the drinks, deciding to empty a few quickly to slightly dullen the perception.
Perhaps it wasn't such a good idea. Or maybe it was! He'd forgotten how little it took for him to get drunk and lose his stupid attitudes towards everyone and everything. The workmates didn't look at all as bad as he'd made them look to himself before, just some slightly less fortunate folk that ended up on the wrong side of the tracks and couldn't help get across, being tossed back to their place by the likes of him. How could he be so stuck-up? Albert was briefly shocked with himself, but another drink quickly solved that, leaving him to joyfully perform at the karaoke machine. His new friends looked at him approvingly, occasionally, even seeming to try to slow him down, but he couldn't be stopped, not by them, not by anyone. He had money to burn, for why have money if it can't be burned? He seemed to remember heading off to another bar with his friends, though then again, he might have been wrong. To be quite honest, now that he just woke up to the ringing of alarm clock and aching of the head, he wasn't quite sure what had happened last night. Didn't seem too awful, though, going to a bar with those three. They sure knew how to have fun. Such were Albert's thoughts as he gathered himself for work.
His thoughts were still a mess when he entered the factory and headed towards his cubicle. Just at the door of it, he stopped, trying to gather his slightly crumbling mind and thinking of what to say to the neighbours, when he suddenly heard their voices from the inside. They were exceptionally early today, all of them. And they seemed to speak of him - a subject he could listen in on for a few moments - and so he stayed. And as he listened on, his eyes grew wider and wider in horror and disgust, mind conjuring images from its depths, and those were not happy images. Well, not now that he was sober. That woman, that dirty, terrible, horrible woman, how could she? How could he? He couldn't have been that drunk! No, this was a mistake, a lie, slander, that's what it was! All lies, and she was spreading them behind his back!
As the thoughts and blood filled Albert's head, his vision dimmed for a moment, his head strangely like a balloon, empty and light. Slowly, a smile instilled itself on his lips, a smile that didn't apply to his eyes in the least. He tore himself away from where he stood and entered the cubicle, quietly greeting everyone and leaning downwards to pick up the materials for the upcoming day. The group seemed to pay little heed of him - even the woman, who continued her ugly storytelling, likely thinking he would approve or enjoy it. Well, silly her.
With that thought, Albert picked up a radio cover and took a swift leap towards the woman. She stared at him, startled, words about to drop off her tongue, as he swung the cover in the air briefly and applied it to her face. Something inside him screeched, trying to stop him, but either it didn't try hard enough, or he was a bit too absorbed in his new, and rather pleasant occupation. Either way, his hands kept moving, blows falling to anything he'd meet in his way. Suddenly, something hit him from behind. It didn't feel like much, but now, his legs could no longer support him, the body won't listen, or even feel. Faced with no other choice, he fell to the ground - facing the monster of a woman just in front of him. He didn't quite know what made him feel so sure of it, but as he looked at her glassy eyes, it dawned upon him that the woman would never again open that stupid dirty mouth. With that, he smiled and closed his eyes.
Commentary: For coherence's sake.
Commentary 2: Same reasons, ending modified.
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