An esteemed ex-tutor of mine recently described me as 'evil'. I haven't given too much thought to what he meant, being as I am busy hatching nefarious plans for world domination to worry about such things. But it reminded me of an acquaintance from some years back who was known as 'Evil Dave (The Bastard)'. Evil Dave, from what I could make out, was not really evil. If anything he was a bit of a nobody who, from what I saw, revelled in the name as it invested in him something close to a personality. Amusingly to these eyes he was neither evil or had any real personality of which to speak. The origins of his monicker (I assume he really was called Dave) are lost to me and of little interest. Where my evil reputation comes from, and whether to sustain it, are my focus here. Okay, so I have a few dark thoughts. Quite a few in fact, but who doesn't? What could be the possible advantages to being evil? And do evil people really think of themselves as such?

I hate to jump on another bandwagon but if you really want to stare into the face of evil, sign up for a Hotmail account and get on MSN Messenger. This apparently simple process will strip your patience from you piece by piece and nudge you gently but inevitably towards insanity. And into the bargain you may find you've rewarded the Microsoft Corporation with enough personal information for one of their employees to assume your identity so comprehensively that they'll be eating Sunday lunch at your mum's table and even she won't notice.

Avoid. Yeah, you're stuck with Windows. Yeah, the new one's the best version yet if only because when it crashes spectacularly it informs you politely that you're work is screwed. But leave the rest well alone and let the new evil on the block get a look-in. Now I'm off out in the rain to kick some puppies.