Something happened in work today that put a smile on my face (no nothing like that you dirty minded bastards!). At roughly 11:30 I received a call on my mobile from an international number that I didn’t recognise – +1 (516) 000-0000

I sort of new that it was going to be some form of cold call, but the ones that I usually get are from mundane things like Insurance; Mobiles; BetFair; etc. In a way I was delighted when the guy on the other end instantly mentioned the word Stocks, and it twigged – BOILER ROOM! Not only did he have a really thick New York accent, but he talked exactly like the guys out of Boiler Room to boot (which is incidentally a really good film – and you should all go watch it).

The guy was actually quite clever in providing a bit of background. He said that we had spoken about 8 months ago, and he actually asked if I remembered him, to which I replied with a confident “No”. I suppose that this is quite a good cold calling sales technique – a lot of people might be embarassed to say “no” and could possibly feel guilty since they can’t remember.

Either way he carried on with his well practiced pitch. He wanted to sell some shares of Apple, asked if I had heard of them, and so I said “No”, but he carried right on. Basically, he gave some technical bullshit of Apple shares, and that if I didn’t make a profit on them in 2-4 weeks that he would “personally buy the shares back off you and get on the phone, to you, and beg you for forgiveness!”. But somehow he knew that I had worked for Accenture sometime in the past. His biggest mistake was thinking that I was still there 8 months ago, and still there now.

When I tried to correct him, he knew that his back story was wrong, and that it was instant Game Over so he hung up. And also Game Over for me before my game had even started! I wanted to shout “Come on! Pick up your skirt, grab your balls, and lets go make some money!” at him, or “RECO!!!”, “What do you take me for? A cunt?” (Gangster No.1), or simply say “Look mate, I’ve seen Boiler Room, and I’ve read The Wolf of Wall Street.”

By the way – that’s a damn good book too – The Wolf of Wall Street. If anyone has a remote interest in Wall Street, stock trading, or even liked the film Wall St., then this book would be a great read since this guy knew how to spend money and gives a good insight of how a Pump and Dump scheme works…

On an entirely different note, I had one of those phone surveys a few days ago to my house. The woman on the other end was a little useless, and didn’t quite listen to what I said. Especially when she asked “Are there any children under the age of 18 in the house” to which I replied “Umm no.. no.. they’re all dead now.”, and she carried on…

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Something a bit techy-ish here lads – and somethingthat could be of use to some people. Below is a calendar download of all the fixtures of the 2010 Rugby Six Nations. It works for Outlook, and should work for most other calendar applications and the iPhone (iThink).

I did originally have a calendar that covered all the Autumn Internationals as well, but I’ve been so slow to post this that they’re almost all finished, so the 2010 Six Nations will have to do.

Six Nations 2010 Calendar – Simply save this to your PC – and double click on it, and it should simply import into Outlook / Calendar app or whatever.

Also check out http://www.livesportontv.com/rugby-union/ – Really useful TV Listing page for rugby (and other sport).

Although I did say that I will be reviewing a few books and games over the coming weeks, I’ve decided to delay those reviews, and do a review of the latest book that I just finished and post the reviews on here in reverse chronological order of book finishing… Confused? Me too.

Anyway – Onto The Book – The Running Man. Apocalyptic Future. Arnie. Great Film. “I’ll be back!”. Lots of Violence. Great. The book though? Hmmmm Interesting one there.

Once again, I didn’t actually know that The Running Man was based on the book, well – technically a novella-ish in length, written by Stephen King. I’ve been on a bit of a mission recently to read as many books that have been turned into films as I can, and then give my opinion on the crossover rating.

The only thing that the film has in common with the book is that the main guy involved is called Ben, the show he goes on is called “The Running Man”,  and that he runs. Actually – scrap the running part. In actual fact Arnie in the movie version “runs” from point A to point B. Ben Richards in the book version is much more intelligent and a lot less eco conscience since he takes a few taxis, hitches a ride, hijacks a car, and takes a plane. And crawls through a pipe.

The Plot – Simply involves a dystopian future. A VERY dystopian future. If there was a very small scale of dystopian futures in novels, you’d have:

• Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sleep – Pah. Not Dystopia at all! So you got a few dangerous robots wandering around, but no worse than a few nights in Merthyr. Could live here easy.
• The Sprawl Trilogy – Meh. So you got strange notions of Cyber Space all around, and AI controls the world. At least you can still get a beer and make some money on the black market.
• The Running Man – Holy Shit. Everything is totally screwed. If you don’t die from being killed by the police for loitering, then you’ll die of cancer from breathing or the flu, no one can afford medicine unless you part of the Network, nearly everyones sterile through radiation, and even if you go on a game show you probably gonna get killed! Lethal!

But back to the plot. To sum it up very quickly you got Ben Richards. Unemployable as he stood up for his rights at a major company, has young sick daughter, a wife and no money. Decides to enter for a game show in the much despised “Network Games”, and gets entered into the most dangerous prime time show of The Running Man. He grabs a few disguises, goes on the run, gets paranoid, and bluffs his way to glory.

Different to the film version, the game rules are simple. 12 hours head start, $100 for each hour you’re alive (with 12 hours paid in advance), and the only rules are that each day two 10minute videos need to be taken each day and mailed to the Games Building. Survive a month on the run, and the survivor will get $1 billion dollars. Which all sounds too easy if it weren’t for these “Hunters” who… hunt… and kill you. Oh and the fact that every civilian that sees you can turn informer, and possibly kill you as well.

The real main difference of film vs. book is the style and approach to the plot. Stephen Kings version has a lot more suspense and thriller, and the only real action comes towards the end. In fact, you only ever get to see one Hunter in the whole book.

I especially loved some of the other sick games that are mentioned (which I don’t remember seeing in the film). These include “Swim the Crocodiles”, and my favourite “Treadmill to Bucks” where people with Heart problems / Bronchitis / Lung problems get paid $1 for each minute they run on a treadmill, and get interrupted with questions. For every question they get wrong, the treadmill speeds up with an increased incline, and they lose $50. Not too sure when they finish though, but I thought it was genius.

All in all – the book is good. Damn good. To make a faithful film of the book would have required a very good director and script writer to deliver the tension and portray the paranoia that the main protagonist faces. And besides, due to the ending (which is really rather good and sort of surprising), I don’t think a film could be made. So skip the film and buy the book and read it. Actually – buy the film and watch the film, then buy the book and read the book.

First post on RantMerchant.com. OK. This site has been up for about a fortnight, and in that time I’ve only actually got round to changing the theme about 4 times, and making the banner, which I cheated with by stealing it from www.banksy.co.uk (although I did improve the image by doing a stylish sepia tone effect whilst still preserving colours a la Sin City, and obviously adding the words RantMerchant.com)

Anyway, we’re off. Hopefully will post a lot more things on here over the next few days. I’ve got a review of “The Warriors”, “The Great Right Hope”, “Operation Flashpoint”, and a lot more…..

In the meantime, read the About page which will tell you very little about me.

And if anyone missed the Title reference, then you probably should check this out: