Royal Pain in the Match

Why I won’t ever play the popular free game “Royal Match”.

WARNING: this gets a bit dark and deeply unpleasant, and may be triggering.

Save the king in Royal Match puzzle game before he DROWNS!

I hate that sniveling grotesque quaking king in the game ads. The sound of his quivering warbling fear disgusts me.

Other people apparently have fun saving him, but I just want the fucker to hurry up and die. Drown, get eaten by the snake, burn yourself up … I fucking hate him. I hate seeing him, I hate hearing him, and nothing about him makes me want to play that game.

I don't think I realized how much the Royal Match King in the ads upsets me until I was making temporary friends with someone on a cross-country train ride. We were talking about apps and games we enjoy, and she brought up Royal Match. I could see the look of horror on her face as I suddenly morphed into a raging spitting bitch, declaring how much I hate The King. I know my entire visage melted into monstrous ugliness as I expressed my vehement disgust with this cartoon character guy that apparently other people think is cute?

This guy is not worth saving, let alone hurrying to help him.

I say this as someone who loves a lot of match3 games (obviously, if I’ve seen so many Royal Match ads that I’m this annoyed by the king in peril - I’ve got to be seeing these ads for the game somewhere).

Writing this post made me google a bit about the Royal Match game. I quickly found out via this post at OldCynic.com that the king-in-peril isn’t actually featured all that much in the game at all! He says,

… the Royal Match app is just like the ads; in that you can rescue the King! But, it’s rare. It’s only on Special levels called the King’s Nightmare.

The old cynic goes on to say that you can even SKIP the save-the-king levels. Phew!

So having read that, do I now want to install and play Royal Match to fuel my match 3 game addiction knowing I do not actually have to see or hear the inept King moron?

NOPE.

Because I don’t just hate the king. In fact, I think the whole entire game is UGLY.

Yup ... even a droopy-brained dog is better at chess than the nose-picking king.

The colors are ugly. The shapes are ugly. The whole look of the Royal Match game is gross and depressing. Compared to other popular match3 puzzle games like Candy Crush, Bejeweled Blitz, and Empires and Puzzles, the design and the sounds are just fucking ugly. Nothing about it is cute or dazzlingly-illuminated or joyful.

I think one of the main problems I have with the game that is not about aesthetics is the message to “HURRY UP”. Hurry up and save this incompetent man with a lazy face who clearly doesn’t even possess a sense of urgency to suck up his own drool in time before it falls and drips down his royal vestments. Have empathy for this king who doesn’t deserve his throne and is going to get the whole kingdom in trouble. I don’t want to be told in ugly bubble letter words to hurry when I’m relaxing, and I don’t want to think about a story where I’m supposed to empathize with anyone, let alone this swollen-lipped stooge. That is not a fun escape (for me, anyway).

Telling me to HURRY UP to save this dumb shit motherfucker doesn't sound relaxing.
Just drown already and let me play a game that is actually pleasurable.

It’s possible that the ads are the problem, not the game itself, and they’re just pitching it to people who are not at all like I am. But of course I wouldn’t know, because the ads are so extremely off-putting to me I will never ever try this game even though it’s possible I might actually enjoy it. I am a person who cannot even bear to have photos of people I love on my desk or hanging on my walls because it’s so stressful and distracting and confrontational, seeing faces and smiles and eye contact. Even when it’s just a flat static image and not an actual human. Like what do you want from me now?!? Oh my god you’ve got feelings on your faces and I’ve got to do something about your feelings and respond to them and I am sure to fail can I not just concentrate on my work for a while? Please leave me the fuck alone with my naturally-flat facial affect!! Who the fuck let you in here?!?

Seriously, the king is almost like my fucked-up stepdad and I’m being told how bad I make him feel by not being more loving towards him. “Help me! Help me!” It’s gross and terrible. I don’t want to save him or be more loving, I just want him to fucking disappear and never open the bathroom door on me again when I’m on the toilet or naked on the precipice of showering.

Royal Match doesn’t look or sound like a charming addictive pleasurable escape into a rainbow bright grid of sweet electric magic with music and sound effects carrying you along on a rewarding easy magic carpet ride. Instead it looks like a second-hand dungeon of seventies furniture. It’s so ugly you can almost smell the mustard and brown plaid couches with the king leaking stale fried chicken and gravy out of his royal ass in a nightmare that takes place at the sadly-run-down Excalibur hotel and casino in Las Vegas.

Royal Match seems like a free buffet in a dingy basement with diarrhea dripping down the walls mixed with the smell of watery overheated green beans all mushing around out of a can, where every metal tub of food reeks of e coli and salmonella and is served by greasy-haired minions wearing unruly sticky comb-overs and filthy aprons with shit under their fingernails.

In the nightmare that is Royal Match’s buffet of kingly peril, you’re invited to load up your plates trying not to slip and crack your head open on cheap steaming moist tiles grouted together with black mold and feces before you try to choke down this absolutely diseased blended-squash-and-rotten-liquified-meat-and-green-peas mush, on the verge of vomiting but being forced to try to swallow it as fast as you can in an act of fealty to this worthless thumb-sucking motherfucker the king.

All the while the king is stuffing his face at the head table making the most pathetic obscene noises as his gastrointestinal distress increases and threatens to explode in a b-movie’s special effects version of a burst colon. What, is he about to cry now? Snot dripping down into his smelly-ass thick facial hair where it will congeal and broadcast an aroma of rotten teeth and stale man-breath?

It’s deeply unpleasant how writing this made me realize how much the king in this stupid game’s ads triggers a morass of extremely yucky feelings about my stepdad. I never made the connection before, but I can see now that it stirs up so many conflicted distressing messages and feelings I received as a child and teen, and memories of actually empathizing WAY TOO MUCH with people like my stepdad who were big gross self-serving unhinged babies and not to be trusted or forced to live with.

I just want to put this nasty bug-eyed fucker out of his misery. The king is beyond saving. I’ll play almost any match 3 game but not this one. I don’t care if it doesn’t have ads. You’d have to pay ME to put up with grotesque nightmare of unfun.

These Goddamned HAIRS

I fucking can't stand HAIRS. Especially my own long strands of bullshit: on the counter, in the sink ... getting wrapped around my fingers.

It drives me crazy: the sensations, their menacing wispy omnipresence. Their motherfucking DEFIANCE.

There is something so fucking gross about them all curled up in slimy wet kitchen moisture when im trying to wipe up the counters.

They are like inanimate ninjas. Tiny tickling ghost zombie legions borne of my own stupid fucking head and its relentless SPINNING SPINNING SPINNING and shedding. Trailing long thin poltergeists of death everywhere I go.

Pedestal STINKS: II

As I try to get the last bit of toothpaste out of the tube and onto my toothbrush, I am reminded again how fucking much PEDESTAL SINKS SUCK!

It's painful enough trying with all the might of my tiny fingers to squeeze any lingering remnants of toothpaste out of a spent tube, but INFURIATING not being able to keep the wee bit of toothpaste extended far enough AND STAY THERE long enough to apply it to the bristles.

It's comical, really. Squeeze with both hands and EMERGE! Let go with one hand to grab toothbrush and ... IT DISAPPEARS!! SQUEEZE! EMERGE! GRAB! DISAPPEAR!

If I had a reliable flat surface to set my fucking toothbrush on and didn't have to HOLD it, THIS WOULDN'T BE A FUCKING PROBLEM. But oh ... PEDESTAL SINK. How fucking ELEGANT and shit this is, half-useless as fuck. There is not enough room to set the toothbrush down without it falling off the edge onto the dirty fucking floor, or just tipping over right at the critical moment because of those soap-holder bumps.

this shit is precarious as fuck, no?

With the house we live in now I'm less likely to totally blame the dude who built it. It's a unique and beautiful creation and we've been lucky to inhabit its spaces for years  He made it with a lot of second-hand and discarded materials, so it's likely the pedestal sink I'm complaining about was salvaged at low or no cost. Aesthetically, it's nice in the super-tiny bathroom space, too.

But from a practical standpoint? Dude ... it would have been fucking helpful to maximize the extremely limited space in this tiny bathroom with a sink with some built-in storage, or just one where if you set your toothbrush on the edge of the sink it wouldn't fucking fall straight into the fucking toilet, which is right next to the stupid sink.

Maybe he even intended to replace it with something better, because it's not even properly attached to the floor. Like, we can just rock it from side to side. It could be lifted clean off the floor, if someone were to be in the mood to pick up a pedestal sink. And I am often in the mood to pick up a pedestal sink, if only to THROW IT OUT THE FUCKING WINDOW, but there is only a skylight in this tiny bathroom, and I"m not quite strong enough to lift the sink above my head AND break the glass. Besides, it would lack dramatic catharsis and would probably not even fly off the roof, but would just land on its side and stay there ... a sink on a roof.

There are a lot of unfinished details in this house ... loose ends of wiring and switches and shit that didn't quite get connected up to actually function. But again, the house is uniquely beautiful, even if a lot of practical things are not fully-functional.

It's a small house, and compromises had to be made for him to fulfill his vision, I guess. Like this one tiny bathroom? It's the ONLY bathroom in the house, and it's UPSTAIRS. Up a beautiful, space-efficient, terrifyingly-steep and dangerous little winding set of stairs. There is no bathroom on the ground floor. It is the furthest thing from accessible for guests with balance issues or limited mobility, let alone anything more challenging. But I guess that's a nice excuse to not be able to host my elderly mom at our place? She's been known to sleepwalk, so even if she can get upstairs to sleep in our bed, I'm petrified she will plummet down the stairs and crack her damn head open if she toddles down the hallway to go pee (in this one bathroom located at the top of the stairs, where one who is unfamiliar with the house in the middle of the night could, even if not somnambulating, mistake the open bathroom door on the left for a closed bathroom door on the right, leading in actuality, when swung, TO THE DEEP DARK DEATH FUNNEL STAIRCASE OF DOOM).

But I digress.

The point I'm trying to make is about PEDESTAL SINKS, and how they are the most pretentious aesthetic dysfunctional insults to the civilized contemporary human with sanitation and storage needs.

If you have space in a bathroom for a fully-functional sink and surrounding surface, but instead choose to install a piece of shit pedestal, AT LEAST install a flat surface and storage adjacent to it. These could come in the form of a period-specific chest of low drawers with a tray placed atop it to be able to set a wet toothbrush whilst protecting the antique wood. I mean, that's just one idea. You fuckers are the ones with the money to "custom build" so you *should* have a superior intellect and problem-solving capabilities but OMG nevermind we all know that is not even remotely true how did you get so rich assholes not talking about our home-builder but like the people selling their homes for the bazillions of dollars with these POS sinks in them.

Stupid, Lazy or Inconsiderate: Just What IS it?

Our quiet residential corner was invaded YET AGAIN by shitty new neighbors running an unlicensed pop-up shop.

Unbeknownst to us, they've been advertising it online for a month with no warning or care given to the people most impacted by a rush of strangers told by them to park NOT ON THEIR STREET or property, but specifically on *our* street. Without any signage or cones or anything to discourage people blocking our driveway or the fire hydrant or our neighbor's parking spots or the trailhead.

So idiots being idiots, all of these fuckers ignore the whole entire street that is empty, and ALL DANGEROUSLY CLUSTER INTO THE CORNER. Blocking our driveway, blocking the fire hydrant, blocking the neighbors, and pulling directly onto the trail to park ON the trail.

I just want to know: WHAT IS IT, EXACTLY, WITH THESE ASSHOLES? Is it stupidity, laziness, inconsideration or a combination of all three?

Is it just ignorance and stupidity (not knowing laws about not parking in front of fire hydrants or within so many feet of an intersection or RECOGNIZING they've blocked somebody else's car in)? A total obliviousness to the heightened risk of crashing into other people?

Is it laziness? Like ah here we are I've arrived at the end of the street where the place is and I don't want to back up or go around the block to park in a safe spot, so I'll just park in the clearly WORST SPOT POSSIBLE and/or I don't want to park five or seven or ten car lengths away down the street and have to WALK all that way, so fuck it I'm going to park my lazy ass as close as possible!

Or is it just inconsideration? I believe this is it. A "me first" attitude in all things. Sure, the stupidity and laziness factor into it in most cases, but when confronting these people what you get is just total self-centered bullshit.

Like the one guy who parked DIRECTLY BLOCKING OUR DIRVEWAY. Before he got out I stormed out and was like, "REALLY?? ARE YOU *REALLY*? GOING TO PARK THERE BLOCKING IN OUR CAR?" And he played like a decrepit little boy with polio or something even though dude's like 67 years old. "I'm not going to be here long!" I'm like NO motherfucker.

And then the cunt (driving a Jetta because of course - see a volkswagon jetta and 9 times out of ten you're seeing a complete jerk) who parked in the blind corner directly in front of the fire hydrant. So I'm taking a picture of her stupid fucking car after she's almost across the street, and she notices and comes back and starts in with that bullshit that cunts who know better but don't care about anyone but themselves do, of "tell me what you need me to do", like she might do me a favor if I play along like I'm the one causing the problem.

I WAS NOT NICE. I am not getting paid to direct traffic. I'm like, that's a fire hydrant. You're parked in front of it. And I'm getting heated -- she's a fit, able-bodied semi-granola gal (no makeup, long wavy hair, but you know she shaves her areas ... like, natural but not TOO natural and does yoga for the hot bod more than the mindfulness) so there's no excuse to not park a little farther away instead of adding to the clusterfuck. It's just that she doesn't care.

So when I refuse to beg her to move her car and instead ask her the question (like seriously I'm just curious if it's laziness, stupidty or  pure inconsideration) she starts in about maybe if I asked NICELY like I don't have to BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH. You're the stupid cunt, and I wouldn't be out here if you didn't do the dumb shit you just did. I'm not like some random angry troll who crawled out of the woodwork for NO REASON; I'm a human who lives here, being disturbed, suffering an assault on the senses, and being trespassed upon by a steady stream of shit-for-brain motherfuckers with so much time and money on their hands they just go around on a fucking Friday morning looking for random fucking crap to buy. I'm not getting paid to provide customer service; I'M NOT GETTING PAID OR COMPENSATED AT ALL TO PUT UP WITH THIS SHIT. So if you don't want people to come out of their homes and yell at you, don't drive into their neighborhoods and do stupid ass inconsiderate lazy fucking SHIT.

The May Day Drone of Lawnmowers

May Day might be my favorite holiday. In a perfect world, that is, where people recognize, respect and honor nature, the seasons and revel in the outdoors: specifically this time between spring equinox and summer solstice (Beltane) when the natural world around us is beginning to flower, the birds are singing, baby animals are exploring their new-to-them worlds on their own young feet, and the sunshine is almost in full bloom.

Or the old-fashioned anonymous flower-gifting tradition. Quietly creeping onto your neighbor's porch and leaving a bouquet of flowers. I LOVE THAT - it is my FAVORITE!

It's not a perfect world, though.

Instead, May Day was filled with the buzzing not of bees, but of people's gas-powered lawnmowers. Violently cutting back the green. The dandelions THAT SHOULD BE HONORED AS FOOD. Imposing this conformity of pollution and death on one another, violating even our eardrums. Making sure we drown out the small sounds of of life all around us that we should be celebrating.

PInk Grapefruit

When I have the tremendous privilege and pleasure of enjoying breakfast in a diner I like to order multiple beverages: both coffee AND juice. If it's an extra-special steak and eggs treat, I'll get a third beverage: ROOT BEER or some other sweet fizzy soda pop.

My juice of choice? GRAPEFRUIT. But first I have to ask, "is your grapefruit juice pink or ???"

All too often these days, they proudly and confidently reply, "PINK!" Like, of course that's the only reason a person would ask. Because they cannot stomach REAL grapefruit juice and need that pansy-ass barbie-pussy pink sweet watered-down tasting bullshit. And almost everyone these days defaults to this blasphemous half-assed fake fruit concoction.

But when *I* hear them say "PINK!" I'm like, JUST FORGET IT. I guess I'll just have orange juice. And even then, you're going to get some pulpless, no-meat, thin, watery shit, but at least it still tastes of some acid.

It really pisses me off, how difficult it is to even find REAL YELLOW-Y STRONG-ASS GRAPEFRUIT JUICE in stores. Instead it's all this flaccid pink-in-plastic sissy-ass shit.

I WANT MY MOUTH TO PUCKER, FUCKERS! GET IT RIGHT!

WHY EVEN PUT THAT PINK SHIT ON A MENU?!?

DON'T ORDER GRAPEFRUIT JUICE IF YOU DON'T LIKE GRAPEFRUIT JUICE!

Give these fuckers who want pink grapefruit juice fucking HI-C or kool-aid or some other watered-down pastel-colored crap.

*****

There should be diners for people who like real food. Hard-boiled egg types of fuckers who want actual blood pudding, dill pickles, and pulpy sour-ass JUICE.

I'm so sick of people mocking folks who don't want to eat stuff with wheat fillers or who are lactose intolerant and don't want milk or butter added to EVERY MOTHERFUCKING THING AUTOMATICALLY, but these same bullies making fun of people who understand most adults don't produce enzymes to digest milk BECAUSE WE'RE NO LONGER FUCKING BABIES are the same immature crybabies who want their food SO FUCKING BLAND as to be nutritionally void user-friendly ultra-familiar CRAP. Oh, you want your steak WELL-DONE and your grapefruit juice PINK; I get it. You have no palate and you can't be trusted with resources - you will just ruin all of the best things, like actual FRUIT JUICE and BLOODY ANIMAL FLESH. Do you want mommy to cut your crust off for you too, you fucking picky brats?

That also brings me to the subject of "home fries". Why would I go to a diner to get potato wedges? NO. I want SHREDDED HASH-BROWNS. FRIED.

If you can't make hash browns, don't even bother offering breakfast in your restaurant. You can't be trusted to fry an egg or fry a burger or fry ANYTHING. I don't want your shit if you don't have SHREDDED GOLDEN HASHBROWNS. And not like an oblong McDonald's potato puck (though AT MCDONALD'S, I am okay with those). Shred the fucking potatoes and fry the fucking potatoes in SHORTNING (not butter) and you should be able to get them crispy WITHOUT DREDGING THEM IN WHEAT FLOUR, you cheating lazy-ass dumb fucks.

Here's the deal: when I order steak and eggs I want the whole experience. The yolks running all over my crispy-on-the-outside shredded hashbrowns, dragging bits of medium-rare or actually-rare meat through all of it. Washing it down with coffee, grapefruit juice and root beer: all kinds of potent contrasting flavors and textures. YUM YUM YUM YUM.

If you can't appreciate that, stick with cans of spaghetti-o's or whatever soft "food" you're into AT HOME.

One Asshole A Day vs YOU

 

“If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you're the asshole.”
    -Raylan Givens - created by Elmore Leonard

Good point.

Something to think about.

I haven't read the books or watched the shows, so my take away is based purely on this quote, knowing nothing about the context.

Here's what I get out of it:

It's not that the world isn't overpopulated with assholes.

It's not that it's unlikely you'll encounter more than one asshole throughout the day.

It's that if you're going through your day and it's just one asshole after another, and that's your entire perception of everyone you encounter, then the problem you're having is with yourself. You're the one making your entire day miserable, and it's likely that someone who does that to themselves is exuding major asshole vibes themselves.

A little bit law of attraction-ish. Not that I believe in that exactly, but maybe you get what you give.