Defeated by entertainment?

[theyellowchair]

The original Police Quest computer game from the '80s (couldn't get past the drug deal in the park).

I'm with you on that one -- however, I used to take pleasure in finding new ways to have my character killed.

[Stupornaut]

The original Police Quest computer game from the '80s (couldn't get past the drug deal in the park).

I'm with you on that one -- however, I used to take pleasure in finding new ways to have my character killed.

My favorite: walk into the path of a dart at the biker club.

[iAmBaronVonTito]

prime-time network television



i love watching television.  it's like the internet, but with less work; i can find just about anything on want on it.  prime-time television is my...well, whatever joke i would normally put here on a good day.

[John Junk 2.0]

More books!

1776

Benjamin Franklin: The First American

Guns, Germs, and Steel


I really want to be a person that can read an entire book about the Revolutionary War or Ben Franklin, but it seems I am not.  I couldn't even watch HBO's John Adams without literally falling asleep every episode.

[Sarah]

I really liked the John Huston movie version of it, though, with Gregory Peck as Ahab.

My fondness for Queequeq dated from that movie.  It was a few years before I read the book and fell in love with the original.

[Man Machine]

I got about 2/3 of the way through "The Sound and the Fury" and I couldn't go on. It wasn't that I didn't like it, I just didn't care.

[masterofsparks]

I got about 2/3 of the way through "The Sound and the Fury" and I couldn't go on. It wasn't that I didn't like it, I just didn't care.

How dare you.

[namethebats]

The Apple IIe game Conan The Barbarian. There are more, but that's the one that still bothers me.

Immanuel Kant.

[Fido]

I wouldn't call it entertainment, but I read about half of the Fountainhead and said, 'nope'. 

I think they may be a dying breed but whenever I encounter a Randhead I want to curl up and teleport away.

I wish they were a dying breed, but I think you may know fewer of them because you're getting older. Early 20s seems to be a prime time for these jackasses. Only the real jerks manage to hold on to this "philosophy" past age 25 or so.

Angelina Jolie is a fan!

Yeah, according to the Wikipedia Rand nerds:

Many notable individuals have acknowledged that Rand significantly influenced their lives, including: Bob Barr, Sinan Çetin, Roy A. Childs, James Clavell, Edward Cline, Chris Cox, Mark Cuban, Paul DePodesta, Steve Ditko, Terry Goodkind, Alan Greenspan, Hugh Hefner, Erika Holzer, Angelina Jolie, Billie Jean King, Anton LaVey, Rush Limbaugh, Mike Mentzer, Frank Miller, Ron Paul, Neil Peart, Robert Ringer, Tracey Ross, Kay Nolte Smith, John Stossel, Clarence Thomas, Vince Vaughn, and Jimmy Wales

So many douche bags united behind a dumb cause. You can throw all those people in my hate pit.

I've given up on so many things. I've probably defeated two video games because once I get frustrated I can't stop thinking about what a waste of time they are. I've given up on many movies and books but they're all usually still on my "To See/to Read" lists. More recently, I tried the new Battlestar Galactica and John Adams but just gave up.

Wow! Douchebags galore, and a lot of people I've never even heard of but now suspect of douchebaggery.

Ayn Rand -- everything I ever tried to read by that woman -- ssssscccchhhhhnnnnnzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Other writers that make me want to sleep:

Moliere
David Hume
Edmund Burke
William Wordsworth
George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Friedrich Nietzsche
Simone de Beauvoir
Poststructuralists

[Gilly]

The Apple IIe game Conan The Barbarian. There are more, but that's the one that still bothers me.

That was so tough.

Another Apple II game that defeated me was Alice In Wonderland by Broderbund Classics. I could never figure out how to get past some freakin' birds in a nest.

[buffcoat]

The original Police Quest computer game from the '80s (couldn't get past the drug deal in the park).

I'm with you on that one -- however, I used to take pleasure in finding new ways to have my character killed.

My favorite: walk into the path of a dart at the biker club.

I got my computer to run this game a few years ago and finally finished it, although with the pixellation, I can't tell whether my character actually won the game or if they switched to some other mustachioed cop halfway through.

[KickTheBobo]

I tried 3 times, but cannot get beyond pg.90 of DFW's Infinite Jest.

[Bryan]

I tried 3 times, but cannot get beyond pg.90 of DFW's Infinite Jest.

Yep, that one requires some momentum. The first section is deliberately opaque, and doesn't become clearer until much, much later in the novel.

[JonFromMaplewood]

The Power Broker
Faces of Death (I was too scared as an 8th grader to get through it)
Don Quixote

Like others, The Fountainhead, Foucault's Pendulum, Riven (Myst was fine, but Riven...)

[yesno]

I was defeated by the teenage girl episode of The Best Show.

oh, and the movie 300.  I Bittorrented it and ended up just doing other stuff on the computer while I kept it playing in a small window on my second monitor.  Except for the gay Persian dude's pretty awesome lifestyle, what a horrible piece of dreck that was.