How many times have you been at a bar and needed to go to the washroom. You go in and do your business only to find out that there is a dude there who’s paid to dry your hands. You try to avoid him and want to do it yourself but you realize that there is no way around him. You’re stuck accepting his services and at the end of it all, you feel guilty for not leaving him a tip. So you reach into your pocket only to pull out a five dollar bill. You don’t want to be a dick and ask for change, so you just hand it to him. You walk out of there feeling angry and ripped off, and from now on you never use bathrooms at shady clubs ever again.

This is one of the reasons I try never to use washrooms and clubs or bars. I’m worried about coming into one of these people and be forced to pay for something I didn’t necessarily need. Sure, it’s not like I actually need to pay, but are you seriously going to be that one asshole who doesn’t leave a tip?

I wouldn’t classify myself as a sucker either. I don’t leave tips to waitresses who fuck up my order, or take 20 minutes to return and ask me if I want another drink. Nor do I give spare change to homeless people (unless the dude forcefully cleans my windshield). But in this case the guy actually has me with my pants down. Sure, I can just not wash my hands… but that’s just not hygienic.

So the other day I picked up a copy of Halo: Reach and I started playing through it. It was a pretty good game with some minor issues. After I completed it I decided to give online a shot only to discover that it was filled with thousands of little kids yelling at me for “getting their team killed.” Pardon me son, I have other things to do during the day than play Halo all day. But after a few rounds I started to get a hang of the game and started doing pretty good. I stopped for a few days and decided to play some online again. This time I sucked even more. It’s like the same 13 year olds were trash talking me again. Again I asked “don’t you have anything better to do all day?”

Playing games is fun and all, but these people spend all their time playing a single game. But it’s not like they enjoy the whole game, they exclusively play online. I was told that I was crazy for not playing Modern Warfare 2 online. Well sorry, I have a plethora of other games to play instead.

Online games don’t immerse me at the same level as a single player campaign. The single player has a deep and rich narrative which brings the player into the whole experience. During online games, your enjoyment relies on others. If you’re playing against 12 year olds in Call of Duty you’ll most likely have a pretty frustrating experience. But that’s not the game fault, it’s the fault of other players.

Am I saying that online games suck? No, it’s just that the single player experience is also really rich and shouldn’t be ignored. All games do not need a forced online mode. Just look at Metal Gear Solid 4, the online in that game was totally not needed. It was also crippled by the horrible Konami ID system. It just seems like too much people focus religiously on online games, and just they play Halo or Call of Duty all day. PROTIP: There are other games out there, give them a shot!

If you live anywhere near Toronto then you probably watch CP24. It’s only the single greatest news channel in the country. You’ve got weather, news, and traffic on the screen, at all times! Sadly it isn’t perfect and it really bothers me.

The first is the horrible CP24 breakfast. I turn on the television in the morning to catch up on news while I eat breakfast. Instead of being presented with news I am greeted with a bunch of bullshit such as a “wake up call.” Seriously? Is this a necessary part of the show? I’m sure everyone would be able to live without it. It serves no purpose. All you guys do is piss off the people you’re calling, it’s not fun and good spirited, it’s just annoying. So many times the person doesn’t answer so they simply call back. Wow? Seriously, just sell more adspace, get rid of that bullshit segment.

The second issue isn’t really one that pisses me off, but it’s one that shocks me. It’s the fact that there is no HD version of CP24. When I watch it on my TV there is so much empty space which could be utilized. I know channels aren’t free, but I’m sure that you’ll get enough viewers on the HD version to make it all worth it.

The G20 in Toronto is over and done with. I didn’t really have a problem with it, but some people did. Natalie Gray was one of them. She is some environmental activist from BC (though other sources say Montreal.) During the G20 Gray claims to have been shot by rubber bullets, sexually abused, denied medical treatment, and strip searched. She is now suing the police for a whopping 1.6 million dollars.

At first I’d like to point out that the whole “being innocent” thing doesn’t work at all. If she in fact DID come here all the way from BC then she must have had a reason for it. She is not “an innocent bystander.” She came here for a reason, and that was specifically to protest. I’m not sure what she did, but she must have done something. She claims that the officer aimed his deadly weapon and shot her twice, if it was a deadly weapon, she would have been dead. After she got shot she claimed that she wasn’t resisting arrest, yet in the video, we see her standing up. Now when a cop says “get down,” then she is in fact disobeying the cops.

Recently in court her lawyers said that she was stripped searched and asked to remove her piercings, Gray claimed that she could not do so without pliers. According to her claims, the police said to her to “try harder or else we’ll cut them off.” However, it wasn’t until the second day of the trial when Gray claimed to have been “sexually harassed.” Apparently one of the officers made a comment about “banging her” and the lawyers interpreted that as “threatening to rape her.” Right, because everyone wants to rape a fat chick who pissed herself while getting arrested.

She is seeking 1.6 million dollars out of this whole ordeal, which to me seems very unreasonable. Even IF the police did use excessive force, I don’t think her damages come anywhere close to that much. I’d give her $300,000, which is pretty fair considering that she is still fully able-bodied and wasn’t disabled because of this. But to ask for 1.6 million? Where does she think the money is coming from? Well, from her own tax dollars. It’s funny how these kinds of people protest the government, but then turn around and abuse our judicial system in order to make money.

Now some of these rebels are making up bullshit conspiracies such as “the police cars that were trashed were fakes.” Really? Fakes? The cops created perfect working replicas of the actual cop cars just for show? The left some riot gear in the car just for show? Bullshit.

I don’t get why people protest the G20 anyways, if anything people should encourage it. The G20 is when the world leaders come together to fix problems in the world. Want shit changed? Stop throwing bricks at windows and write to your MP. Write to your governor. And if you do decide to protest, then well do so. However a protest should have a purpose, if you want to legalize abortions hold up a sign that says “LEGALIZE ABORTIONS,” give out pamphlets, or talk to people. Yelling “FUCK THE POLICE” doesn’t count as protesting, it counts of being a jackass.

For everyone crying “police brutality” give me a fucking break, what we’ve seen at G20 was nowhere near police brutality.

So yet again we have an Apple press conference. I have talked about Apple press conferences before: here, here, and here. Now the media has a thing for blowing this shit out of proportion, making a big deal about every minor thing that Apple releases. I guess I do too.

First came the iPod Shuffle. After the last shuffle which was the size of a quarter. It seemed Apple did some market research and learned that people actually want buttons on the device. What a shocker! So the current Shuffle is practically the same as the one we had 2 years ago. Great! It’s a nice device for anyone who just wants a cheap device to load up with songs. It does not need a screen, it does not need wifi. It’s just a simple-ass music player. Along with adding the controls, Apple also added an additional 5 hours of battery life. Fuck yeah.

Following that we had a dramatic change to the iPod Nano. While the Shuffle got controls, the Nano lost them. The Nano is now an 1.5 inch square screen that plays music. Not the change I hoped for but at least they got rid of that pointless camera on the back of it. Apple boasts to have multitouch on the device which leads me to my next question. Why the hell is multitouch important on a 1.5 inch screen? I don’t think that an 1.5 inch canvas is enough to do any gestures. Another thing that pisses me off is the clip. It’s basically an iPod Shuffle, with a screen.

Next comes a device that I actually want: the iPod Touch. Take the iPhone 4 and take out the phone (and LED flash) and you’re left with the iPod Touch. It’s fairly impressive: you have the retina display, you have the 1ghz processor, and you have the dual cameras capable of recording 720p. All is good, but the price of it sheds some light on how over priced the iPhone 4 is.

The 32GB iPod Touch is 320CND.
The 32GB iPhone 4 is 780CND.

That’s a difference of 460CND.

The 32GB iPad is 650CND.
While the 3G version is 780CND.

That’s a difference of 130CND.

So what’s the deal with the other 330 dollars? Okay, so add in the cost of the GSM antenna and LED flash. That’s nowhere near 330 dollars.

Apple also announced some bullshit social networking service aimed at music loves. Totally ignoring the fact that Myspace exists, Apple decided to show their spin on it. I guess it’s kind of a neat idea, if it wasn’t run by Apple. This whole service is just a way they can push you to download more music. Joe Biden likes “Love Game” by Lady Gaga, WOULD YOU LIKE TO BUY IT RIGHT NOW FOR 99 cents? A friend of mine mentioned a great idea: what if you could share your music with a friend kind of like what the Zune had? You can share the song with a friend and he can listen to it a limited amount of times before the song expires. Brilliant! But instead you are force to buy it.

But the worst of the worst has to be the new Apple TV. They took the current device, and just gutted it. They removed the ability to watch 1080p, they removed the hard drive, they removed all the syncing and other “complicated” bullshit. You are left with a device that can only steam movies and TV shows. You no longer “own” any content. Watched a good episode of Glee and want to show it to your friends? Well, you’re going to have to re-buy it. Sounds great no? They did drop the price of it to 120CND, but that makes me wonder, what made the old one ~$250 anyways?

Also, Apple showed no love for the iPod Classic and continues to sell it for $270. That’s an incredible price point by today’s standards. If they dropped the price of it to 199 that would be great! Hard drives aren’t that expensive anymore, are they?