~The Voice Of The Big Guy~

Quickest Blood Donation... ever?

2012-02-07T20:42:00.001Z

Th snow kept falling Saturday evening, so much so that we ended up getting about 3 inches in Derby as opposed to the inch and a half predicted. Snow stopped falling at just before 11pm, and a nice coating was left which would inevitably cause problems the next day.

Sunday
With the snow still very much present on the pavements causing havoc for walkers, let alone the cars passing on the untreated roads, I decided it would be best to chill inside until I had to leave to give blood.

I left much earlier than normal when walking across town for the donation thinking that it'd be very slippy and that I'd have to take a lot of care in my steps. However, I managed to arrive at 3.05pm - 15 mins before my due appointment. So I went in, handed in my sheet, grabbed some water and sat down.

before I could even sit back, I was already called up to do my tests - usually I'm waitiung for a good 10 mins at least. Tests were done very quickly too, and I was told to wait over by the stage. Before I could even walk across to there, I was called up to donate and I found myself lying on the table and donating within about 4 minutes of arriving. The donation took exactly 5 mins 33 seconds (the lovely women informed me), and I was sitting up and ready to go and have snacks and a drink straight after.

A cup of tea and biscuits awaited me already, and I felt really good chatting away to staff about films and university, and I felt well enough to leave at 3.19pm, a mere 14 mins after I arrived. Surely the quickest donation I'll ever do - it usually takes just udner an hour.

Big thanks to the staff at The Spot for making it uber easy and lovely on Sunday. I'll be in about 5 months time (can't do it in 4 months - sad times)!

Walked back in the now slushy roads and pavements, chilled in my room and watched the football. It was a good game between Chelsea and United. In the evening I watched some of the Superbowl until my laptop blue-screened and died on me. And that was pretty much my day.

Monday

Monday was an early start, but I felt really awake unlike last week. The walk in the snowy slush was horrid, but got to Barry's lecture and found I engaged with it really well and we did a lot of practical elements playing around with blocking and the 180 degree rule as well as playing with a Canon 5D Mark II which is NOM! Can't wait to book those out next year :)

This gave me 50 mins to get across town to meet at QUAD for Steve's lecture. I had enough time to pop back home and grab a quick bite to eat (especially as it was on the way from the uni site). Met with everybody at QUAD and we were given a tour of the new exhibition in the gallery which was set up by the tech team at QUAD - all in house. It was really good what they'd been able to do, and it was so interactive and great fun. They spoke to us about their jobs in QUAD and how they got to where they were.

After this, we were taken up to one of the cinema screens and we were told all about QUAD and what it offers as a community building. It was interesting, and afterwards I chatted with one of the guys who runs some of the film events who was great at really passionate about what he does. Cheers QUAD!

Food shopping times occurred after this. £11 spent and this would be my last food shop for 2 weeks as next week I'll be away in Milton Keynes.

Dropped that back with incredibly cold and wet feet from the slush, and then chilled for most of the rest of the day. I had a nap as I felt shattered and was awoken by a Red Cross call. Then I found myself being unable to sleep until about 4am :( I think I'd have struggled if I'd have not had my nap too - I'm used to these things now.

Tuesday/Today

Woke up at 11.30 today, got myself ready for Russell's lecture and headed there soon after. We watched a couple of shorts and talked about budgeting on a film and how money is divided into different things for the production side of film making. I did argue that a £300 budget for 12 people on food for a 3 day shoot was way too excessive, even if it covered breakfast, lunch and dinner. I argued throughout that I could cater sufficiently and to a high standard for under £200 :P

The lecture was fun and passed quickly, and I headed back to the flat via the mail room. Most of the snow is gone now, but some paths still have the slushy, icy stuff and so do some of the roads. With temperatures dropping to about -12 tonight in Derby, I doubt they'll be gone in the next few days...

I've decided that I'm going to have to move into flats again next year as - well - I have nobody who genuinely wants to live with me next year in a house. I don't mind. I think on the face of it, halls works out a few quid a week less than private accommodation including bills, but I probably would have been able to watch TV in private accommodation on a shared TV license :( Will apply again for halls soon.

I've just chilled this evening so far. Listened to music, drunk some coke, had some soup...nothing too interesting. Earlyish night tonight I hpe, followed by a day of work and films tomorrow.

Gotta love BANTER.

2012-02-04T19:04:00.003Z

My first post of this wonderful February...and I post just as we get our first snowfall of the winter here in Derby.

I've done another Vlog. It pretty much covers everything I'm going to write about but in a bit less detail, so if you're lazy, you can just watch that and not bother with the rest of this post. Or, if you love me so, you can watch it AND read - amazing, right?! :)

Wednesday

A lovely day off from lecture. In all fairness, I probably should have done more with it. Having been up all night - and speaking to people organising things - I ended up getting some sleep at about 8.30am. And it was then that I had my first ever "sex dream".

It was weird.

I've never had one before, which some people find strange, but personally, I'd rather not have another again in my life. It wasn't 'bad' so to speak (in fact, it was with two women :P), but I literally woke up feeling like I'd been mentally raped. It was a horrid feeling.

Anyway, I woke up at about 12.30 and the rest of my day was spent doing very little. I had to attend a "Welcome Meeting" like the one I had back at Sir Peter Hilton. Apart from Alan, I was the only other non-international student who had to attend. And to be honest, I didn't REALLY need to go. We simply talked about how halls work, and then watched the same 30 min DVD that I watched at my first welcome meeting. Nonetheless, it was compulsory for me to attend.

I then put Beverley Hills Cop on in preparation for the next day's lecture. I only watched half of it, and I'll explain why in a moment...

Thursday

I had another bad night of sleep. I tried going to bed at 11pm, fell asleep quite well, and found myself - not for the first time - up 2 hours later and unable to get back to sleep. It was horrible.

But, I made the most of my time awake by doing...nothing. Joy.

I eventually dropped off to sleep at around 8am and I had planned to awake at around 11 to leave enough time to eat, wash and get ready for my 1pm lecture. This did not happen though. I slept right through my alarms, and awoke in a panic at exactly 12.40. Somehow - and I don't know how - I managed to wash, get dressed, brush my teeth, gather some food in my bag AND walk to my lecture in exactly 12 minutes. If I could only do that every day...

The lecture was ok. We ended up watcing Beverley Hills Cop in full (so was essentailly a second viewing for the first half of it for me). I'm going to be honest, I didn't like it much. The story was weak, the humour was hit and miss, and the best thing about the whole film is Eddie Murphy's terrible, terrible laugh...and Axel F theme. But I think comedies such as that have been done much better, but I can still see why it is seen as a 'classic' comedy film.

5.5/10

But I felt really down all day. No idea why. Just felt really off. Something small in the evening really cheered me up, and was completely unexpected. It makes me smile right now, thinking back to it.

I went to bed at a sensible time of about 11pm...

Friday

...and amazingly, I had a brilliant night of sleep! I slept all the way through until about 5.30am, and although it would have been better to sleep a little longer, I felt so refreshed and happy. It's felt like such a long time since I last had a decent night of sleep. They're very rare for me.

No lectures, so most of the day I spent drinking tea, listening to music, sorting out my life and just chilling. I did do a bit of work, but I really have to be "in the mood" to do it. I feel in the mood at the moment, actually, so I think I'll crack on with some work after I post this.

In the evening, I picked up a DVD from the office and met two of the RAs here. They seemed lovely, and welcoming. I like Nunnery. The DVD I would get back to the flat and watch straight away...

It was Kubrick's Lolita. I was unsure of what to expect in terms of style and how the context of the film would be portrayed, but I really, really enjoyed it. Even though we never see anything - only hear the characters talking about it - I'm still shocked it managed to get through the censors in 1961. It really does border with sensitive subjects that the 60s really weren't prepared for. However, it's beautifully and simplistically shot, gripping, has some hilarious moments to cover what they're not permitted to show (Camp Climax, anybody? :P) and I thought it was executed very well.

8.5/10

I then had a shower, and so sat on the computer in my undies before bed. Some girl then started knocking very loudly on my room window. I open the curtains to see her flashing her bra at me suggestively, before quickly covering up and realising she'd gotten the wrong window. Oh dear...

Saturday/Today

I got another pretty decent night of sleep last night, and found myself awake at 11am. Today I had one objective and one objective only: get my eye test done and dusted.

I set off knowing that today would be the first bought of snow this winter, and thankfully, none had fallen on my journey. Went to a very busy Specsavers, waited and was seen to. Had 3 pre-tests done, waited for a bit, had my main test done and found that my right eye - like my last test - had degraded slightly. My left eye remains just as bad as always for a second year running. Which meant I needed to get some more new glasses.

I don't mind new glasses. I get my eye appointment and most of the money off my glasses with an NHS voucher as I'm aged 18 and under and still in full-time education, but that'll change for my next appointment, so I was determined to get the most out of it. Two new frames chosen - quite bolder frames than I've gone for before - and after sitting around for ages, I was able to get my sizes measure and a mock pair "fitted" and I'll pick them both up next Saturday. £29.90 altogether - I'm not complaining. But this means I now have 5 pairs of "wearable" glasses.

Walked back to find it had started snowing. It hasn't stopped since, and we now have a good 2 inches+ on the ground. I suspect that will rise in the coming hours, but the snow is expected to stop by about 11pm.

Blood donation tomorrow will be fun to get to, even funner when I'm feeling a tad weaker than normal on my way back. But as always, I'm looking forward to it :)

Who'd want to live with me next year anyway?

2012-01-31T20:39:00.002Z

Hello again you lot. What lovely reading do I have for you today? :)

Sunday

Sunday was just like the day previous to it - boring. I don't actually think I did much. I remember waking up, doing almost nothing, having a shower, then doing little after that except making and eating porridge for dinner. You could say it was a wasted day of existence. I think my whole weekend was that to be honest. I went to bed at just before 11pm hoping to awake refreshed at 7.30am ready fr my 9am lecture...

Monday

...but that didn't happen. I ended up awakening at 1.30am and being unable to sleep whatsoever, so was up all night...doing nothing. This I knew would be catastrophic - when I'm tired, I can't concentrate well, plus I was due to have two lectures followed by a pub trip with the coursemates and then clubbing in the evening.

So, at 8am I got myself breakfast, even though I'd been up for 6 and a half hours. I really wasn't feeling like eating something 'sweet' like my normal breakfast does, and I was craving a dinner after having 'breakfast' in place of my dinner the previous night, so I ended up having spaghetti bolognese :P It was quite nice actually at 8am.

First lecture was on lighting with Barry. I really needed concentration with the lecture, but it wasn't to be found. I was tired, and most of what was said went over my head. Thank goodness I have the lecture notes. Lighting is crucial and key and something I really want to master. I felt so tired that when we were setting up the lights, I took a back seat as I feared I might break something. I got involved with the light meters though - they're fun to play with.

Our lecture with Steve - originally scheduled at 1pm-3pm in Britannia Mill - had been changed to 2pm-4pm at Markeaton from this week onwards, so this found us from Barry's lecture with two hours to spare. I normally would go back to the flat, grab some food, maybe watch some TV... but instead, I found myself with Howard, Matthew and Paul at a nearby pub sinking a lovely cider :P

We had a good chat and covered the 2 hours well. We talked loads about film and a lot about The Green Mile - one of my few weaknesses. Just talking about the film brings tears to my eyes, and this occasionally reduces me to bay-tears. This was one of those times. How embarrassing.

Went to Steve's lecture where my concentration was at an all time low, but managed to do most of the work set and concentrate enough to know what I needed to do. And then it was pub times! We had a decent turn out actually, much more than normal. About 15-18 of us ended up walking to Wetherspoons in town, and as I had no lunch and it's logical do so, I got yet another burger and a beer/cider. Nom.

It was another good visit, and time literally flew. It was 4.30 when we arrived, and 9.30 when we eventually left xD Lots of banter, lots of fun, and lots of love for my coursemates ❤

I was so tired when I got in that I decided clubbing was going to have to be skipped. I'd been up since 1.30am, and I finally went to bed at just after 11. I was shattered, and slept very well after a lovely evening. I'd spent £8.80 though out of my £20 budget... :S

Tuesday/Today

After a nice night of sleep, I found myself up and ready at 10.30am, although my lecture wasn't until 1pm and a production meeting was scheduled at 12pm. So I begun planning what I needed to do with the rest of my budget, and came to the conclusion I'd have to dip into my "overspill" money (money that I have saved from the left overs of my budget each week) which is what it was designed for and wouldn't put me out of pocket for my main budgeting. Shopping and laundry needed to be done.

Went to the production meeting, those who turned up had little to say, I had a few things, not much was discussed to be honest. Once we get going, we'll have a lot more to discuss, hopefully.

The lecture was quite good. Lots of talk about roles and the industry as well as seeing how screenplay's adapt to screen before we finished up by watching A Short Film About Killing. I really enjoyed it, and without giving too much away, one scene in particular was very hard to watch. The subtitling was awful and not done correctly - even I could tell and I speak no Polish - but it really was a film that makes you think afterwards for quite a while.

8/10

It was a cold day today, so walking back from the lecture left me frozen, but I had to go shopping, so put 5 layers on and braced Sainsbury's in the town. Sainsbury's was bare of food, and most of what was on my list they didn't have in stock, so I only got about half of what I needed, but it still set me back just under £15. I swear food has gotten excessively expensive since I got here in September.

Walked back, unpacked my stuff, and chilled every since.

Day off tomorrow, so will try and do some work and watch films related to that too :') I say that now, but we shall see... :P

I change my mind - I LOVE university... finally.

2012-01-29T01:37:00.000Z

Since I moved out of my last flat, life here in Derby has honestly dramatically improved. I dunno why. Maybe my massively positive attitude to 2012 has contributed to my euphoric look on life? Maybe me actually just saying "f**k it" constantly and doing things with little to no thought has caused this change in fortune? Maybe it was actually my former flat which made me feel like crap? Maybe seeing my friends back in Milton Keynes reminded me of how amazingly fortunate I am? Whatever it is, I hope it doesn't stop.

Carrying on from my last post, I was utterly, utterly shattered. Reduced to a mess with no sleep, I think Tom's lecture was the quietest I have ever sat through. People knew something was up with me. We watched The Virgin Suicides which I've seen before - I loved it even more so this time. It's such a good film.

I should have gone hoem straight after and slept, but it had no got the strange period where you are too tired to sleep, so I found myself popping on a DVD. The DVD I just happened to watch was Ferris Bueller's Day Off. It was amazing! It was smartly immature, the classic comedy moments that I'd seen parodied many times over I finally got to see and the whole film was brilliant from start to finish. The final chase scene was brilliantly done! Classic!

8/10

I then ended up cooking and finally settling to bed at a reasonable and slightly late 9pm.

Friday

Friday started off at 4.30am. For some reason, instead of my body wanting to recuperate the loss of sleep, it had instead decided that an adequate amount was fine, and thus I was awakened naturally at 4.30am and found myself unable to drift back off.

So what did I do with my day off? Well, I FINALLY got around to watching the whole of Pulp Fiction. I'd seen pretty much all of the film before, albeit in a muddled mess and months apart, so seeing it in its entirety was well overdue. It is simply amazing! Tarantino still amazes me at how he conquers and succeeds in making long periods of dialogue so natural and...well...interesting. The film as a whole was clever, simple and make for amazing viewing. Slots right near the top of my film list. Simply superb!

10/10

Soon after that, it was time to meet up with Justina as we would be heading off to the cinema. We watched Shame at QUAD. It was very well done, very artistically shot and some scenes are so breathtakingly brilliantly done (the restaurant scene, for example) that I was genuinely amazed at what I was seeing. Definitely not one to watch with your parents though. It felt awkward for me as there were two quite elderly people a few rows in front. They seemed to love it just as much as I did. Verges on pornographic at times. But amazing film making.

8/10

Afterwards, she had to kill some time, so we walked back to mine and talked for a while. I showed her some POVs of some coasters which I think scared her a little, we popped to the off-license for her to get some alcohol and then she insisted on walking herself home. I wanted to be a gentleman :(

The rest of the evening I spent doing stuff for the blog - LOOK, A PAGE DEDICATED TO ALL MY FILM WORK >>>>>

Check it out. I'll constantly be updating it with all my videos, scripts etc.

There's also a Facebook comments section below each posts page, allowing you to comment on anything much easier than the former way. Go for it! Comment away :) Your feedback is crucial :D

Saturday

This was my lazy day. I did virtually nothing. I slept in late, and then I got in and sat around doing very little. Planning for my birthday has started, however. Might be going to Milton Keynes. We shall see :)

F**k it.

2012-01-26T07:36:00.004Z

I'll say this now for all those who are worrying: I've had a much, much better last few days than Sunday. I guess keeping myself occupied, being back in lectures, seeing my coursemates and just generally being out of the flat have all contributed to my better mood.

Monday

Indeed, Monday was the first day back after the - in my opinion - far too long Christmas break. With a change of lecture times, I had two lectures on Monday: Technical Processes and a new unit, Professional Practice. Waking up at 7.30am was hard though, especially as I had what would normally be seen by most as a 'bad' night of sleep whereas for me it was good. I kept waking up every 30 mins or so for about 5 mins before drifting back off again. I felt refreshed, yet drained at the same time.

A brisk walk in the freezing cold, and I arrived, ready in time for 9am. The lecture was just going over what we were doing this semester and what we did last semester. Once again, it seemed like I was the only person awake - I do talk a lot more than most people, I think. I'm getting a reputation.

A fairly basic lecture, but it would be the start of me getting my grades for work I handed in just before Christmas. So, for Technical Processes: B for my journal, B- for my 30 second film (group mark). In my eyes, B was what I was aiming for in that unit, so I'm pleased I matched my goal.

After a quick hour break in which I treated myself to some cider, it was back to lectures with a two hour introduction to Professional Practice. I don't remember much about the lecture (no, it wasn't alcohol related forgetfulness), but I do remember Steve asking for opinions from the class, looking directly at me and saying "Have you not got something to say? You're very quiet. You've always got something to say" - reputation sealed by another lecturer :P

I got my result back for my 4 min film too - I got a D-, which I am pleased with as I thought my film was tosh and that I'd have to redo that unit, so D- means a pass and no worries about it :D

Went back home, chilled for a bit, then went shopping. On my way I popped into the old flat to see if any post had arrived for me. Sarah escorted me down to the common room and checked the mail - nothing to be found. Was weird being back in the old flat though, even if it was only for a min.

Food shopping was done, home was entered, shopping unloaded. That was pretty much Monday.

Tuesday

Just the one lecture on Tuesday, so a bit of a lie-in was had before venturing in at just before 1. The room with Russell was stuffy and horrible, as were the individual seats, but somehow we got through it. We were deciding which scripts would be made by the class, and Russell short-listed the 'best' for each group and then 7 of those scripts would be made.

I made the short-list :D I was pleased with that, but my script wasn't chosen to be made. I don't mind - I'll keep that script and improve it. I may pop it up somewhere soon and see what people think of it.

Our group decided on a script and we should start pre-production in the coming weeks. Exciting times.

I also got my grades from Russell for my script and paperwork - I got a B- for the paperwork which is great, and an A- for my script which I was delighted with.

Got in, watched NEDS as I'd been meaning to see it for a while. The film started off well enough, but I felt the change in the protagonist from a smart guy to a thug was too sudden and it didn't feel natural at all. There was little transition and to see his change of character happen so quickly didn't work. The story was ok, the acting ok, but it really lacked something which is a shame. It had potential.

6.5/10

Wednesday

Yesterday was a good day. Not only did I have an AMAZING lie-in until 2pm (I needed it), but the evening was amazing too. In between that, however, I did watch Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Being my 3rd favourite book in the series, and after the terrible Order of the Phoenix (both book and film), I was looking forward to this. And I was pleased. The film didn't feel as long as it was, it was gripping and it had a nice feel to it. The only thing that annoyed me was the (SPOILER) Dumbledore death scene wasn't emotional at all, nor the scenes afterwards. For me, the saddest part of the book was emotionless in the film (END SPOILER). Much better than Order of the Phoenix though.

7.5/10

After that, it was time for another course night out, and a number of us met at Spoons again for drinks, banter and just gossip. I decided a burger and beer would be necessary as I had hardly eaten and felt like treating myself. It was meh, but oh well.

It was an amazing evening. So much I shan't put on here, but a contract was proposed and signed, I found out a lot about drugs, and Tom's story about the church was even funnier second time around.

We were there for over 5 hours - it flew by! I love these guys. They're awesome. Looks like we're out on Monday too - should be fun :)

Came home, tried sleeping, and failed many, many times, hence why this post was posted at gone 7.30am and why I'm annoyed with literally having had no sleep -_-

Thankfully, I have one lecture today and then it'll be the end of my week. Yay!

Yes, I have been crying, so what?

2012-01-22T23:05:00.001Z

I had a pretty good day yesterday, which ultimately led to the miserable day that I had to endure today. The small, niggling things on my mind just caused my good mood to plummet today, and now I find myself back in that ever so present depressive state once again. Thanks life. Thanks once again...

Yesterday was good for a few reasons - firstly, I realised I'm actually close to somebody in Derby. It may have taken 4 months and having to realise that I hate most of society, but I realised just how awesome a friend Justina is. Me and her have really clicked, and although up until last night she thought I was gay (why do loads of girls think that I'm gay?! Just because I'm nice, respectful and not like most guys, it doesn't make me gay...) which was quite sweet as she said I was not like any other British guy she'd known. In all honesty, she's the only proper friend I have her in Derby...

Anyway, we went to see The Artist at QUAD. I've been buzzing about The Artist for many, many, many months now, so I was so glad I could finally see it, and was pleased that it was an absolute sell out at my local independent.

The film itself was a great homage to silent film (I LOVE silent film), and the comedy was a lot more modern, structured and appealed to modern audiences which was great. I was laughing and smiling throughout the film and I didn't want it to end. But then it did. And then I got angry. Why spoil an amazing homage to silent film by having...MODERN CREDITS?! I mean, I understand that it was a big production and everyone should be credited and that credits have changed dramatically the last 90 years...but still. Was a sour note on the end of the film. "The End" should mean the end like it used to...

Ignoring that, I loved it. I really did.

9/10

After that, I went back to Justina's halls and saw Filip from our course. We chilled for a while, all chatted about numerous subjects before I join Justina and loads of people from her hall for a drink. After hopping from bar to bar, we finally settled in Wetherspoons where I had a cider and ranted about things in life to Justina and two people who would listen. Not sure if they liked me or not afterwards, but let's be honest, I'm probably never going to see them again. Heck, if I do, they'd not remember me and they'd not want to hang out with me anyway. They never do.

The friends of my old flatmates who came to my old flat I always saw as 'their' friends, and I was told I was silly by my old flatmates and told that they were my 'friends' too. But not one single one of them has spoken to me at all since I left. Clearly they were not my 'friends'. I was right from the start.

Anyway, after a while, everybody went home so I walked home too and that's when the thoughts started. Don't get me wrong, yesterday was amazing and I couldn't stop smiling until I got in. But then the little things were playing on my mind.

This continued to today. I've been in a really depressive mood all day. Just the tittle things niggling in the back of my mind for days, weeks, months even in some cases. Stuff about relationships, about me, about other people, about why I'm always treated like shit when I treat others like gods, about university, about loneliness, about the future, about friends, about the slow non-existence of so called 'best friends', about all the shit I've been through the last 2 and a half years to get here, about my options, about what I want to achieve in life... a lot of things and then some.

But in a positive light, this is my first depressive day of 2012, which is now 22 days young, so I'm doing well I guess - well, much better than normal.

In fact, one small thing really made my day. I went to collect some post that I needed to sign for, and I met my new Residential Assistant (RA). She was really nice, welcoming and recognised me and was asking if I'd settled in ok. Just that small act of kindness made me smile. I needed it.

I stuck on Nowhere Boy not long ago. I loved it more than I expected, and it felt like a film that I could see myself making in the future. The story was good and strong enough to keep me hooked throughout, I loved the feel of the film, and it was a really nice watch. Not amazing, but good.

7/10

I should sleep now. First day of lectures tomorrow with my first starting at 9am. Not looking forward to a 7.30am wake up, but hopefully I'll be feeling better tomorrow. If not, I'll only feel worse. I might find myself crying to sleep now, who knows...

Mary and Max = amazing!

2012-01-21T15:49:00.000Z

You have no idea how utterly boring the last week or so has been. Not only have I been on my own for all bar one evening (I met my first flatmate Rico and his friend Faran, both of whom remind me of my brother and his friend Kalpan). I got a little tipsy that evening after they offered to drink with me. I would have gone out with them afterwards, but my sleeping pattern is all over the place since I moved in.

In fact, most evenings I've tried sleeping and either failed, or had a couple of hours sleep before being wide awake again. This has caused me to need to nap during the day, thus not feeling tired in the evening and not getting much - if any - sleep. The cycle continues.

What with me needing to be up at 7.30amish on Monday, I really need to iron out sleeping times.

Don't even get me started on irons. I was handed an official warning on Monday. One more mistake, and I'm out. Great.

So yeah, it's lonely here. Imagine not speaking to anybody for pretty much two weeks, and then you'll know how I feel. I can't wait to go back on Monday to be honest.

I watched Mary and Max a few days back. It was amazing, truly brilliant. The characters were some of the best I think I've seen in a long time and I really connected emotionally with them. The clay animation was amazing, the story was cute and emotional, and the whole film made em cry many, many times. Simply brilliance, one of the best films I've seen.

9.5/10

My flights to Canada and the US have been booked :D It's actually happening for sure now :) I cannot wait!

Off to the cinema with Justina tonight to see The Artist, following on from when we saw 50/50. Been invited out for drinks and a night on the town, but will probably only join for a drink or so as my budget is quite restrictive, even more so that I'm saving for my trip.

Belated 2011 Review

2012-01-17T19:21:00.000Z

I've done one of these now for the last 3 years, but I'd not found the time to do one this year what with the situation I found myself in at university and all the stress that entailed there. So I shall do it now, just a mere 3 or so weeks into 2012 :P If anybody needs reminding of the format of these posts, check out my review of 2010 which was posted last year :)

It's safe to say that 2011 can be divided pretty much down the middle - the first six months and the second six months. It's safe to say that the first six months were MUCH better than the trailing six months.

Comedy became the base for the start of 2011 really. Samantha, myself, Josh and Leonie found ourselves going to a comedy club each months at Xscape and had a really good time each time we went. We went to see Milton Jones first which was a brilliant night, and then later that month myself and Samantha went to see my favourite comedian Jimmy Carr at MK Theatre which was brilliant.

Sims' party I got smashed at, which was great. A few days later I was announced as Head Boy which I was shocked and pleased with, although I felt the predecessor still deserved the title more than anybody.

Me and Leonie got quite close and I really started to like her, and the closer we got the more I fancied her, so I plucked up the courage to ask her out at the beginning on February and I was shocked and delighted when she said yes :)

More comedy time occurred and one of the comedians found track of this blog and decided to read out large parts of it to everybody during her set - that'll teach me for answering a question she asked us in the front row :P

Then I took part in the Sixth Form University Challange thing against other schools in Milton Keynes. We did our best ever, finishing second narrowly missing out to Ousedale.

Then it was my 18th birthday which I actually 'celebrated' for once. It was a nice evening going out for a meal with some of my closest friends, it was just a shame it ahd to end prematurely during my first experience of clubbing. Oh well.

Now that I turned 18, I started going to the pub a lot with Lottie and others. This was the first time of many throughout the year, and it was very memorable to say the least :')

In April, I took a trip to Alton Towers and finally obtained the Th13teen cred - good times.

Royal Wedding times occurred, which was a nice excuse to have the day off of school.

Bin Laden was killed. That was a big piece of news, I guess...

And then in June, things started to go downhill. I pin point the exact cause as being when I got glandular fever and was ill for pretty much 3 weeks, and this clashed with my exams which I didn't do very well in at all. In fact, I had to be removed from my film studies exam as I felt so ill. It was horrid, and it was the first time I've ever had to go to the doctors and the first and only time I have or hope to have ever taken medication, even if it was just penicillin.

Very soon after my exams finished, me and Leonie broke up and that really tore me into two, but luckily I have my friends to pull me out of the gutters and they tried to cheer me up :)

Then I came to the realisation that I actually wasn't looking forward to going to university at all. I maintain and still maintain that university was a decision forced upon me and may not have been the best option for me.

I remember having to call the police for the first time when I saw a group of people having a fight. That was a weird day.

Then I got quite emotion on the last ever day in formal education when we had the sixth form leavers assembly and leavers ball. Like my Yr 11 prom, I wasn't in the right mood to say I had an amazing time, but it was a lovely farewell and I had a much better time than the last prom.

Then randomly I was asked to take part in Dragon Boat racing while walking around Willen Lake. That was great fun!

Ashleigh's 18th birthday was a great night out too - much fun was had.

Finally, aged 18 years and exactly 5 months, I finally went abroad! It was only a day trip, but it was great - Plopsaland theme park, Belgium and France. Good times.

The massive UK riots occured in the summer too. They were fascinating to watch and yet disgusting at the same time. I don't think I'll ever see anything else like it in the UK ever again.

Then it was results day. What an awful day. My results were poor, I thought I'd not gotten into any universities and I felt awful all day. I had my film studies remarked as I was 1 UMS point off the grade I needed and thought I should get (it came back 11 points up, which gave me the 'B' I deserved), and I was bitterly close to what I needed with my psychology as well. Terrible day, although I did find out I'd gotten into my first choice Derby...but I couldn't care less that day.

Then I started university. Two parts to that: Part 1 and Part 2. It started well enough...

...but soon I fell into a massive depressive state. I was lonely, not engaged socially very well, had money issues due to Student Finance and I hated, hated, hated everything.

And then just last month things got worse when my flatmates fell out with me and then my brother falling very ill and having to go into hospital. I had to move out of my flat, and as you know, that's what I did just a few short days ago.

So that was my bloggings and life of 2011. As normal, we have the nominations and winners of a list of categories which I always do.

Best New Friend of 2011

No nominations for this one, the winner is clearly Stacey :) She's been so awesome and I'm so glad I met her. We talk so much, have so much in common, talk about everything and anything and she's like a penpal who I get to see every time I go and see Mother :) Lots of love for Stacey :D

Best Album of 2011

There's no defining winner in this category this year. Really tough to choose, so here's a selection of my favourite albums from 2011.

Nero - Welcome Reality

Known about Nero for a while through their unreleased stuff on Youtube, but it wasn't until I heard Me and You on a Radio 1 advert that I actually realised they were releasing stuff. Picked up the album, was blown away. It's made of nom, and I went to see them live a few months back which was quite insane.

Noah & The Whale - Last Night On Earth

Been a big fan of Noah and The Whale since early 2008 when they released Peaceful The World Lays Me Down. LNOE is a massive change from the predecessors, and certainly feels more mainstream, but the core roots of indie folk still remain and the album isn't at all terrible. A number of really good songs.

Chase & Status - No More Idols

I was a MASSIVE fan of More Than Alot - and a lot like Nero - I was a massive fan of their unreleased stuff on Youtube. I was looking forward to No More Idols but it didn't quite meet my expectations. Some of the collaborations seemed to purely be done for mainstream credit, some of the songs were just terrible, whereas some were pretty decent. The album is growing more and more on me though.

Adele - 21

You either love it, or hate it. I love it. Miles better than 19, soulful, emotional, beautiful. I like most of the songs on there, whereas 19 is hit or miss. Actually, I hate Rumour Has It. It's terrible. But otherwise, this is why 2011 has been a big year for Adele. If you haven't listened yet, give it a go.

Olfar - Harbour

Onto a few bands/singers whom I discovered this year and have just released their first album. I found Olfar by mistake, and when I saw they were offering their album for free, I snapped it up and gave it ago. I wasn't expecting it to be so good. Beautifully written songs and perfect for winding down. It's a real shame they're hardly known about, because I can see them being very big.

Benjamin Francis Leftwich - Last Smoke Before the Snowstorm

Once again, I stumbled across BFL by accident about a year or so ago when he was releasing some EPs. I really enjoyed them, and found myself among a small fan base who was really loving his music. I'm so pleased to know he's done well and his album was a massive success, because it really is beautiful. Such a lovely voice.

Kate McGill - Replaced

Well, Kate McGill... saw her on Youtube, listened to her album in August, was blown away. I'm so pleased I got to see her perform live to about 30 people and got to meet her and get my album signed. The album is the most played album of 2011 on my iTunes, and rightly so. Her songs have so much meaning, you can hear the emotion as she sings them and it's quite simply amazing. LOVE LOVE LOVE!

Ed Sheeran can get a mention too, although I'm not a big fan of the album. One or two songs are ok, the rest just don't do it for me. I don't understand why so many people my age 'love' his stuff - it's mainly the chavs I'm shocked about. I just don't get it.

There's probably a plethora of other albums I've forgotten to mention, but yeah, 2011 I found some really decent artists who I hope will make it big sooner or later.

Best Single of 2011

I genuinely can't make a list. Not been a fan of most singles this year. I'll just name the first one that comes into my head - Nero's Me and You. Reminds me of good times, good people.

Best Film of 2011

Nominations:

The King's Speech
We Need To Talk About Kevin
Tyrannosaur
Stupid, Crazy, Love
The Inbetweeners Movie
Super 8
X-Men: First Class
Bridesmaids
Senna
Winnie The Pooh
The Fighter
Black Swan
127 Hours

Winner:

Quite a strong, big list this year, and it's very hard to pick one film out of all of them as my 'top for 2011'. I think I'll pick the film that I never expected to like, but simply loved - Bridesmaids. A brilliant, hilarious comedy which I was expecting to be pants. There are better films on that list, but I loved Bridesmaids so much that I saw it twice at the cinema :P

...but on a more serious note, I'd say Black Swan or We Need To Talk About Kevin.

Best New Experience of 2011

Going abroad. Hands down.

Best New "Credit" of 2011

Well, all of my 'new' rollercoasters were mainly in Plopsaland (except Th13teen), but for me it was Anubis at Plopsaland. Fun, awesome launch and had excellent rerideability. To be honest, all other new 'credz' for me were pretty pants last year. 2012 will be a bit more interesting in this category, trust me ;)

So, that was 2011. 2012 has started strongly - let's hope it's a 12 month high instead of 2011's six months of WIN... :)

It's film review catch-up time!

2012-01-16T18:08:00.000Z

Because of my long absence from day-to-day blogging, I’ve accumulated a lot of films that I’ve watched and not written down my ‘review’ for. I know a lot of readers enjoy reading what I have to say about the films I watch, so here’s a special film post on all the films I’ve watched recently – sorry that I’ve not watched as many as normal, just been so busy.

First up is Lesbian Vampire Killers. This was truly shockingly bad film. The concept is bizarre and stupid, the acting is mediocre to acceptable at best and the comedy elements seemed nonexistent. It’s not often I actually want to switch a film off, but I did about a quarter of the way through LVK. Complete and utter tosh – the only rewarding part was occasionally seeing some boobs.

3/10

The rest of the films I’d been meaning to see for a while and finally got around to watching. Stranger Than Fiction I thought was an interesting film which worked better than I expected. I’m not sure that I would have cast Emma Thompson as the author, but I think she filled the role well. The comedy element was there but not too strong and it was better than I anticipated.

8/10

I’d seen most of Knocked Up before, but not the whole film. It was much funnier than I remember although the comedy was sometimes few and far in-between. The story was better than I remember too and it really did have the Judd Apatow feel to it (he’s quickly becoming one of my favourite comedy directors/producers/writers).

7/10

You may have heard a little while back about Colin. It was the zombie horror feature that was made on budget of £40 and manaed to be relased and shown in a number of London independent cinemas. This, of course, sparked my interest as I’m now a film-maker and I wanted to see what could be done on such a small, tight buget.

The film itself had all of the potential to be quite an average to good zombie horror flick…if it had the budget. The potential was there and I think that must be recognised. However, due to the crappy nature of handycams, it did look quite poor at times and I could go on forever talking about lighting, sound etc. An excellent little feature on the budget it had though.

6/10

I’d wanted to see 50/50 for quite a while, so when it finally reached my independent (my local chain cinema wanted t charge me £8...), I snapped tickets up straight away. Ok, so there isn’t as much outrageous laugh out loud moments as I was expecting – in fact, I think there were none – but comedy was throughout the film and it carried the right balance of emotion and humour. Sensitively done and makes Anna Kendrick look hot as always.

8/10

Trust I was annoyed about during it’s initial relase as David Schwimmer heavily promoted the film and its release was so small that nowhere near me at the time was showing it. However, I finally managed to watch and I was pleasantly surprised.

Hard to watch at times, brilliant acting by Liana Liberato – definitely one to look out for in the future – and I really felt the emotion of the piece. The final scene is disgusting in ways that can only be described by watching the film.

7/10

Eagle vs Shark

Quriky and very indie, I strangely enjoyed Eagle vs Shark. The story is very thin on the ground, but works over the course of the film due to the strange characters and the situations they find themselves in. Funny at times, it really reminds me just how wonderful indie cinema can be and how one day I’d love to be there making a film like it.

7/10

And finally, Danny Boyle’s Sunshine. I’m nt a huge sci-fi fan by a long shot, and Sunshine seemed to be a combination fo pretty much every sci-fi disaster movie set in space that I’d seen. Y’know, Alien (to some extent), 2001 etc etc. It was expertly shot and I’m so pleased to finally hear John Murphy’s The Surface Of The Sun in it’s original context. Such an amazing score and used very well.

But it has its flaws. The plot was a bit boring at times, it was quite predictable throughout and I had a few space-related niggles at it. But still a very good film.

7.5/10

:)

Moving in! And in the process, briefly moving everybody else out...

2012-01-15T06:29:00.001Z

The last few days have been quite hectic. After finalising the move I signed my new contract and found a hidden £25 charge that I have to pay for moving flats (I SHOULD have been informed about the charge earlier…). I picked up my keys and took a good look at what would be my new home.

So that was that. Home. I just now had to transport everything I own from Sir Peter Hilton Court to Nunnery Court. Normally a 5 min or so walk, carrying heavy loads would set me back a good 15 mins each as well as completely knackering me. Oh well. It had to be done.

And done it was.

I did it all unassisted (except for one run where Georgina kindly carried my Xbox to the new flat before we chilled for a while). It was exhausting and I found myself doing a lot of the moving at stupid hours of the morning to avoid being seen carrying items – I would be up most nights from 1am until 6am carrying items over. It sounds silly, I know, but not only do I enjoy the tranquillity of night time, but I also wouldn’t be stared at.

I literally did around 15+ trips there, 15 trips back over the course of the last few days. It may have taken 3 whole days and nights of moving everything, but now everything is finally moved in, placed somewhere and I’m happy. Still no sign of flatmates, but I’m sure they’ll be back soon. And what better way to settle into a new place than to spend a few days relaxing and chilling. Bliss…

…or at least that was what I was doing until 4.30am last night/today. I couldn’t sleep (the late night moving have cocked up my sleeping pattern), so I decided I would so something productive to help pass time. I had quite a few things which needed ironing and with my extra large work space, I could move a few things over and crack on with some hardcore steaming action.

The iron was relatively new (I’d used it once quickly before deciding against ironing at that time) and I filled up the iron to about half capacity with water as normal. I turned it on and waited for it to heat up. When the pilot light goes off, that usually indicates that the iron is hot, roaring and ready to go. Not in this case.

In fact, the pilot light decided that it wouldn’t go off at all. I assumed it was just taking a bit longer than normal to warm up, but after steam was coming from the top, I thought that it should really be done by now.

So, yeah :P I won’t sleep at all tonight – I now see no point – and here I am feeling like a bit of a twat for waking everybody up, but at least I can laugh it off and they were all understanding and lovely about it all :)

Nunnery Court have been nothing but friendly and welcoming :)

Bad is never good until worse happens - I'm moving flat.

2012-01-10T18:12:00.000Z

I’ve had a lot of people asking me what’s been happening and I think it only seems logical to write a post explaining the situation I’m currently in and sending the link on – means I can explain to a lot of people a lot easier, especially as it’s now a very busy time for me.

To sum up very quickly – I’m moving out of my flat at Sir Peter Hilton Court into a flat in Nunnery Court in Derby. I should be picking up my keys tomorrow morning and I’ll have a few days to lug all of my stuff over there and settle before handing my current keys.

Now for an explanation with a bit more detail:

Just before the Christmas break, there was a massive, massive fallout in my flat. It’d be wrong for me to go into massive details and the people who need to know what happened know. I feel I didn’t do too much wrong, and those of you who know me well would know that I’m never a nasty, vulgar or aggressive person. I assure you I was none of these. However, it’d got to the point where many of my flat mates felt that they could not live with me in the same way any more. I felt the same, and I asked to be moved as I really wanted my flat to be happy.

I’d always said that if two or more people were unhappy with me being there, I’d move. Moving one person is easier and more proficient than moving two.

I was given the Christmas break to assess my options. I’d been informed that I could move flats if I desired and that could be arranged, or I could stay in the current flat.

Throughout the Christmas period I toiled with my options – one day I’d wake up and feel that what happened was very silly and that I should just go back and try and move on, the next day I’d wake up and feel that it was best for the flat as a whole and for my own development to move out.

I had until when I came back to decide, and I’d really struggled to make a decision. On the one hand, I love (and still do) my flatmates. I couldn’t care what happened, I’d miss them dearly if I moved out and I genuinely love and care for every single one of them. But then again, my social life has been shockingly poor since I got here. They really do feel like my only proper friends here, people I could hang about with comfortably and be myself around. I have my course mates, but in all honesty I don’t know them well enough, and I’ve struggled to meet people outside of lectures/living…

So moving out seemed like a good option. Meet new people, start afresh, expand my social life.

Then again, I could end up moving in with people who I’d get on even worse with. They could hate me even more and then where would I be? I’d have to move again – if they’d let me. I’ve still got another 7 months in halls and I’m still to find people to share a house with next year.

I had a meeting yesterday with my hall manager. She could offer me two flats if I chose to move: 1) A room in a flat in the same halls of residence, same block, one floor up from me – mixed flat. I could move in to it in 3-4 weeks time. 2) A room in a flat in another hall of residence (Nunnery Court) – all male flat. I could move in straight away.

I went to view that flat at Nunnery Court to keep my options open. I’d never been into Nunnery Court before, so I met with the hall manager who took me to the room I’d be staying in and gave me a quick tour of the site. The room was narrower and longer than the one I’m currently in, and the carpet was awful (he assured me it would be cleaned). It was spacious, but seemed very empty and I couldn’t imagine myself there. I was told that they’d not been renovated for well over 10 years and that they’d be given a new look in the summer. The kitchen was much more modern than the one at Sir Peter Hilton, but about half the size.

The flat overall isn’t as nice as the one in Sir Peter Hilton, but I could see it being very homely once everybody is back.

The hall of residence has a cat too, which I saw lazing around in the common room. That’s a nice touch and it’s been hard living without a pet for the first time in my life. It’s made my loneliness even harder.

I left and had the night to make my decision, and in the evening Sheonagh was back. She wasn’t here when everything happened and I did miss her dearly so we had a ‘girly night in’ and ate pizza, chatted about stuff, went on the internet… it was nice. It made me think of the amazingly good times I’ve had here…

…the epic shower times...moving in day and seeing everybody for the first time…me slicing open my wrist (weirdly a fond memory for me)…the days when the rugby lads were in…when we all went out dressed up as school kids…the days when we had people over to drink…I could go on…

I wanted to stay. I wanted to forget what had happened, make amends and stay with the people I really loved. Vicky came in drunk which was hilarious and I didn’t want to leave. This was the first time in about 6 weeks that we were talking, and not shouting or blanking. But I knew that I needed to wait until Vicky sobered up and have a serious talk with her, and with Rob and with Sarah.

I struggled to sleep last night. I was up until about 3.30 with Sheonagh anyway, but after that, I just kept playing things through in my mind. It’s a tough decision to make, especially when you see a glimpse at how things used to be.

I eventually dropped off at about 7am, and I was awake at 2. I tried messaging Sarah asking her if she’d feel comfortable living with me still, but she’s away for a week and can’t respond. I know what her response would be, and it wouldn’t be one welcoming me back into the flat, which I accept and understand. Vicky also said that she wouldn’t be entirely comfortable with me being here any more and I was glad she was so honest. I wasn’t upset at hearing it at all – I’m glad she could be so honest with me. Rob came back today too and I spoke to him and he said he’d be happy either way if I was here or not.

But that left two people not comfortable with me in the flat, and like I’d said from the start, that’s enough for me to leave for the sake of the happiness of everybody else.

I had my meeting with the hall manager and told her what I’d thought about over night and that I’d spoken to everybody and told her my decision:

I would be moving to Nunnery Court.

I’m sad at leaving especially under the circumstances. I’ll miss everybody dearly and I hope to visit regularly, but it’s agreed that it’s best I not be here any more.

I know nothing of the people I will be living with other than the fact two are Spanish and they’re all guys. They won’t know I’ve moved in as they’re all away, so it’ll be a surprise to them when they come back. I hope they’re nice people. I’ve gone through so much shit since June that I’m determined to make 2012 a happy year.

I pick up my keys tomorrow and will start to walk my stuff bit by bit over to my new flat.

Leaving Milton Keynes equals sad face :(

2012-01-07T01:42:00.000Z

I've been back in Milton Keynes now for just over a week. God how I've missed it. And yet here I am spending my final hours here writing this post and thinking about the long, tedious and dull journey back to Derby tomorrow afternoon. And as much as I love Milton Keynes, part of me feels it's time to go back up North.

Having been away from Milton Keynes for the longest time since I moved here in 2000, coming back was a strange, emotion and I felt back at home as soon as I arrived. It's shocking seeing just how modern Milton Keynes is in comparison to London and Derby. Heck, I knew it was modern, but only after living in post-WWII mass populated and densely packed cities for the last 4 months does the modernicity of Milton Keynes shine through. I kept trying to find a building older than perhaps 30 or 40 years old. Heck, even Fishermead looks modern...

The last week has been lovely - Martyn's parents have kindly put me up for a week allowing me to stay in their spare room and I've managed to catch up with so many people whom I have missed dearly. Being away from them for so long and being so distant from them sometimes makes you forget just how amazing they really are. I have amazing friends and I'm so grateful to have them :)

I forgot just how amazing Furzton chips shop is! Nom chips - better than any in Derby.

I forgot how meh clubbing in MK is in comparison to a student city like Derby - tonight was the most dead I have ever seen and yesterday I ventured to Oceana for the first time ever, paid £4.50 and found it was just a better managed, slightly bigger and better attended version on Derby's Syn.

I forgot just how many people I actually knew - when I was up the city with Lottie, every 2 mins or so I passed somebody I knew, said hi and had a short conversation. I must've done it at least 10 times, probably more.

I've collected so many second hand CDs since I got here, it's great! :P I've accumulated so much since I've been in London and Milton Keynes yet somehow managed to pack it all into pretty much less than what I took down with me! :P

And tomorrow beings the start of what I hope will be a much better second half to my freshers year. I feel so happier in myself and much more confident as a person. 2012 is my year.

Now, just to spend an hour and a half+ in CMK station tomorrow, a 1 hour train, a 40 min wait, a 25 min train and then a 25 min walk to do tomorrow...

Goodbye Milton Keynes! I'll see you again maybe over a course of a dirty, filthy weekend ;)

Happiness is just a Flaming Moe away...

2012-01-05T00:34:00.006Z

I have a sudden urge to blog. I don't know why, and the chances are that this will all be unstructured gibberish, but here goes.

2012 is my year. I know it. This is the year that I finally discover myself, finally enjoy myself and finally find the inner confidence that I know I have. I've said this before - I said it for 2012 and 2011, but I really do think that 2012 is the year.

I mean, I'm at university and the first 4 months were just 'settling in', getting used to things and finding your feet. That's done now, although for me it might be starting again when I get back with the possibility of me moving flats. But I really have had this inner confidence surge from inside me. I feel more independent than ever, I've started realising just how short life is and how quick time goes and I'm starting to realise just how precious each second is.

Until the start of this year, I'd never spooned anybody before. The idea seems strange - who'd ever want em to spoon them? But when somebody asked me to at Elena's NYE party, I didn't think twice about it. I don't like saying the word, either on its own or in a sentence, so when I say "Spooning is such a nice thing", to me it doesn't sound right. But it is. It's such a strange, lovely, warming thing to hold somebody in your arms while you sleep. It's amazing. It's the best start to any year I think I've ever had. Does that sound creepy?

If you've ever wanted me to spoon you, I suggest asking me soon - chances are, I'll say yes.

The past couple of days I've had such a warming feeling inside me which I'd lost since my illness back in May/June time last year. My deep depression has gone and I look at the worst things with only positive thoughts, and they don't seem as bad.

I valued my friends more than ever and I've valued the time I've spent with them even more so.

Am I changing as a person? I hope not, and if so, I hope only in a positive way. I hope I stay the same as I always have, but maybe a little more smiley. Maybe a bit more "f**k it" than I normally have been. Maybe when I see somebody I like, I won't shy away waiting to find out whether they like me, but maybe I'll try and find out myself. Maybe.

A few days ago, I was dreading going back to Derby for a number of reasons. Those reasons stay the same, but now I see the positives of them and the idea of going back to Derby suddenly isn't so bad. There are people I just want to wrap in my arms and hug tightly - you know, that kind of hug where you don't need to say anything, you just hold each other for a few minutes.

I hope this feeling doesn't die down. I hope during the lonely, sad, depressing and stressful times that I no doubt will have this year I'll think back to how I'm feeling now and it'll churp me up again.

Happiness is just a Flaming Moe away...

The Voice of the Big Guy has lost his ability to talk

2011-12-26T22:34:00.005Z

Hello there. As you can see, I've not posted on here in a while - well over a month now - and since I started university back in September, I've really struggled to find the effort to sit down and write and recall my days. It's not like they're interesting or anything, or maybe a bit controversial or juicy, but it taking a lot for me to just sit down and dedicate 30 mins a day of time to write.

This post isn't going to talk much about the last month or so. Needless to say, a lot has gone on, and a lot of I'd rather not even think about. I might write about it soon, I may not. I want to be able to recall it in a few years time like I have been able to with the rest of my blog, but writing about it now seems very hard. There's stuff that people would rather I not mention on here, there are things which seem pathetic and stupid but mean a lot to me, there are things that if I think about will bring me further into a deep sense of isolation and loneliness. I may visit these events soon, I may never revisit them, but I feel they must be documented if only for myself.

The last 6 months or so have been utterly shite, and as much as I'm trying to pick myself up from them, I know they'll be shite for some time to come yet. University was not my choice - it felt very much forced by other people and the situations I was in. Other events coinciding at the point of transition from school to university and the neglect and absence of those whom I hold dear all culminated in a hiatus of comfort and belonging. There is no one moment that I can pinpoint which started this spiral down, but I know that whatever it was which was the catalyst for the last 6 months was out of my control. My locus of control is fairly internal, so to even speculate or point at an external event becoming the detrimental factor in one of the worst periods of my life is absurd in my eyes.

But with that, I know that I am still myself. I still have that internal locus of control, that sense that the world is mine and my actions alone dictate whether I move forward or not, and it's that which I am using to create a sense of optimism in my life at the moment.

I have a lot of decisions to make in the next few weeks and I have a lot of opportunity for change. Whether that will be positive change or negative change is yet to be seen, but the opportunity lies in my hands and I am responsible for it.

I can't say whether this will be the start of another downfall or the start of the uprising in my life, but I can tell you that nothing can or will stand in my way.

For now, The "Voice" of the Big Guy needs resting, whether it be for a day, a week, a month or forever.

Why Parcel Force is better than Royal Mail

2011-11-18T17:41:00.001Z

"Why are Parcel Force better than Royal Mail?" I hear you ask. Well, if you are asking, you're silly, as everyone knows even snails on the Moon are faster than Royal Mail at delivery post. However, the true reason why my post is named as such is because instead of my TV arriving today (as I was told it would do), it arrived a whole day early - yesterday :D

So, after I awoke at 9am to sign for the parcel, I found myself finally with my TV and Xbox... or so I thought.

I went to get my Xbox out from under my bed, and I opened up to box to find it was gone and replaced with books and a fajitas pack. I was not a happy chappy, and I knew who was the culprit.

So there I was - 9am - banging on Rob's door in a sleep deprived state, begging for my Xbox. I assumed he'd be in - after all, what uni student is up and out at 9am? - but he wasn't, and after waking up the entire flat and well and truly pissing them off, I gave up, got a bit stroppy and decided that it was best I go to bed and wait until Rob gets in.

So I did.

At just after 12.30, a knock at my door, and my Xbox :)

And so I started to set it up. The TV was much easier to set up than I thought - simply plug the power in and turn it on and it was already set up. The Xbox was pretty much the same, although as you can see from the picture, a lot of config settings had to be done first (as well as creating a new Xbox Live account).

Goodbye the rest of my life:

So tehr est of my day was pretty much spent on the Xbox. I had numerous breaks - don't worry - but in the end I think I was on it pretty much all of the time between 2pm and 5am :S I would have stopped earlier, but I genuinely wasn't tired.

I did - however, stop for over an hour to got to Tesco and get bottles of coke and I also had a shower, so no signs of major addiction yet. It's making me happier.

And that was yesterday.

Today I was awoken by a fire alarm test at 12.30. I wasn't pleased as I thought it was genuine, but at least I was up :P I've been on my Xbox for half of today, been on the laptop for some of it, been organising my room for the rest of it and doing work for the last part. I'll balance the rest of my evening on Xbox and maybe doing work. I have to get the work done... and I have to start filming by Wednesday...

The laundry room has been out of action for 3 days now :( I have literally no clothes, including underwear and socks. I'm not happy.

Oh how I love my Tuesday evening lecture!

2011-11-16T20:48:00.001Z

Where should I start... The last few days have been up and down so much, and things got really bad yesterday, but got better today.

Sunday night was successful, and after I posted my post I went straight to bed and slept until 3.30am, after which I awoke and couldn't get back to sleep, so watched Holy Flying Circus on iPlayer which was amazing and some other TV stuff.

On Monday my Xbox was expected to arrive, however, the TV wasn't due until Friday which meant I would frustratingly have to stare at an Xbox for a whole 5 days without being able to play it. Needless to say, when it arrived and I signed it, I didn't want to let it go, but I had a lecture in the evening, so I did...

Tom's lecture wasn't too bad. We talked about history within film (as in film depicting historical events) and problems and successes in film playing that role. As part of it, we got to watch a film I've been wanting to watch for a while but never put on my list. United 93 was incredibly powerful, sensitively made and packs a real emotional impact. The casting is brilliant, it is gripping (even though we do know the exact events of the film before we even watch it) and it's a film about people and people power rather than on terrorism and the attacks, although those issues are obviously present within the film.

8/10

I got in, cuddled my Xbox more and then decided it was best to put it away out of view until Friday...but not after trying to steal Rob's TV :P Rob had a few of the people over whom I met on fireworks evening and they played drinking games in the kitchen before going out. And soon after I was so tired I went to bed soon after.

Tuesday

Lecture day, although instead of Russell's scriptwriting lecture we had 10 minute individual tutorials for our scripts. Mine was at 1.20, and as I got up quite early, I did some work, lazed about and didn't do much else.

My tutorial frustrated me. I was about 30 seconds late, but that didn't matter as Russell was still seeing the person before, so I waited around for about 5 mins before he called me in. He didn't talk much about my actual script, just that it should look like an example he gave and that I was on the right track. I kinda felt like I was getting 'generic' feedback rather than individual feedback. He then asked me to pass on a message to somebody who slept through their tutorial before it was over. We spent about maybe a minute or two talking about scripts and 3 or 4 about other things, which was annoying. What made me most disappointed is that not once was I mentioned by name - not a "Hi Ciall" or a "...to improve Ciall, I suggest..." not even a "Cheers for coming Ciall", yet he could happily reel off a list of people as we talked who could make my script next semester, which seemed to be his 'favourite students' list. It's like I'm yet another number in this bloody organisation. I felt like just a number and worthless :(

Went back, felt a bit downbeat over that, passed on the message I was asked to pass on to somebody and just got abuse back which many other people from my course 'liked' (coincidentally, mostly Russell's 'favourites') and felt even worse.

Chilled/felt glum, got something to eat and headed to my next lecture which always cheers me up no matter how bad I feel.

When I arrived, I went in first, got out a chair and sat where we normally sit. Nobody sat anywhere near me. In fact, there was at least a metre gap circling the back of me in a horseshoe shape throughout the whole lecture. No exaggeration. It was if I was deliberately targeted and nobody wanted to be anywhere near me, the trend of course started with the people who were more than supportive of the abuse I got earlier in the day.

I tried not to let that get me down, and as usual, I loved Barry's lecture. We looked at sound and got to play with microphones, grips, recording devices and everything, so I feel much more confident in all of that.

Got in and fell into a massive depression about what had happened that day and all the other things I've posted on here about, as well as some I haven't. I've been really, really bad and I said that by Christmas I'd have decided my future. That's a month away. I chatted to Sarah about all the things on my mind (and a lot more) and she made me feel a lot better, but I'm speaking to people at the uni over the next few weeks about it all so I have meetings set up to help me with that with councillors. I hope they help before I get worse.

You don't want to hear all of that, and I don't want to think about and type it, so let's move on...

In the evening, me, Alan and Sarah went to Riley's and had an hour and a half of pool. It was nice, and I was playing decent form (if you excuse the fact I potted the black a few times :P). I felt much better, and when I got in I tried sleeping but was plagued with thoughts. Dropped off at 3.30am.

Wednesday

Today was a much better day than mos of yesterday. I awoke at 12, got ready and went straight to my first lecture. On my way, I saw Steph from my course and we walked literally all the way from Sir Peter Hilton to Markeaton Street talking. It was lovely, and then we sat next to each other and talked more for the first part of the lecture until we had another - bland, albeit important - lecture on how to use Final Cut Pro. I need to get my filming done by next week, preferably.

Walked back with Steph and a few others, found out that the washing machines are all out of order meaning I literally have no clothes until tomorrow (I'm wearing my last socks, underwear, jeans and wearable t-shirt), picked up mail and chilled ever since really.

My HDMI cable has arrived, so I'm all set for Friday. Not been on my mind really - just need GTA to arrive (which will take a while as I had to ring them for security reasons earlier before they dispatched the item), but Rob has said he'll lend me some games and I'll end up investing in a few over the coming months.

Now for one day of work before 4 days of Xbox bliss :)

I've gone and spoiled myself with an Xbox 360!

2011-11-13T21:32:00.001Z

I've had something playing on my mind for a while, so Friday night I decided to do something about it.

What has been on mind? Well, my last post touched on it - boredom. My life currently consists of: Waking up (whenever that may be), sitting around doing nothing, going to any lectures I need to go to, occasionally doing work, loads more sitting around doing nothing, trying to sleep. Most of my days are full with the boredom.

What I've been thinking about it how Sarah and Rob are gamers, and as such, they talk about games and all that. I used to be quite the gamer, albeit, that was many years ago. Nowadays I can just about talk minimally about a few titles that come out on various platforms, but otherwise, I'm stumped. I've been wanting to get back into gaming for a while.

And what with my money coming through, me budgeting so well AND a bonus £400 coming out of nowhere, I decided that I would treat myself.

So I bought myself an Xbox 360 and a 22" HD LCD TV. Now, I don't want any PS3 or Xbox fanboys commenting on whether I made a good/bad choice, let me just say now that I made my choice even though I have always LOVED Playstation simply as getting an Xbox makes more sense. Financially, I have 3 other people in my flat (1 or 2 of which I'll be moving in with next year) who have an Xbox as it is, meaning we can share games and save money. I know of nobody here in Derby who owns a PS3, and most of my friends back in MK have an Xbox anyway. Yes - I know I'm missing out on a blu-ray player - and as a film buff, I should really own one - but I only own one Blu-Ray as it is, and I'm not looking into making the complete switch from DVD to Blu-Ray for quite some time yet. Do I even need to mention that the Xbox is cheaper than the PS3 too?

It was a lot more factors than those listed above that made me get the Xbox, but it was still quite a rash decision. I thought about it and had ordered it within an hour. The TV took a bit longer to order as I sought advice from people over which TV to get, but it was all swiftly decided and I feel I won't regret it :)

So how much has this set me back? Well, I bought a 250GB Xbox which was £170. I got £10 off of that using a voucher, and then had to pay £5 for delivery and it will arrive tomorrow, so that cost me in the end £165. The TV cost £144.99, and is an LG. That cost me nothing for delivery, but it won't arrive until Friday. I also bought a HDMI cable which cost just under £2 and I'm in the process of buying GTA IV for £11 (I need to ring up Play for security reasons to do with my card).

Total cost? £327.47.

Not bad, I think, especially as the TV will be used next year for TV as well and when I get a desktop, I'll probably use the TV as a monitor too.

The thing that will annoy/upset me most is seeing my Xbox tomorrow and not being able to do anything with it until Friday :(

Anyway, Friday was yet another night of being unable to sleep, and I eventually managed to drift off at 6am...again. I awoke at just after 2ish and did pretty much nothing with my day. I listened to the football (MK Dons won 6-0 in the FA Cup 1st Round :D) and that was about it. I may have eaten, who knows.

And then once again I didn't get to sleep until silly hours, only this time it was because of the people above me and teh flat to the side of me (my room borders with a flat next door), both of which decided to hold parties from around 10pm until 8am. Seriously. There was nothing I could do about it. It was very loud and impossible to sleep through.

I eventually dropped off at about 8.15am, feeling very pissed off. I awoke today at 2.30 feeling even more pissed off as I knew that meant I would be up until silly hours tonight...again. I'm going to try and combat that, however, and when this post is done I shall try and go to sleep.

When I did get up earlier, I got ready and went to Sainsbury's as I'm struggling to find meals in what I have. I ended up spending just under £12, which to me very little in all honesty, but I got al that I needed to make a spag bol which I cooked this evening and froze two portions.

And since then,. I've slaved away on my work which I'm going to catch up on before Friday so I have maximum time with my Xbox. I'll do as much as I can tomorrow too before my lecture, will then probably do more when I get in, then sleep (or try to).

Wish me luck with tonight's sleep... I need it...

Boredom leads to sleep, sleep leads to dreaming.

2011-11-11T19:20:00.001Z

If you missed my 3am post, you can catch it here. I was bored and still awake, hence the awkward timing around it. I ended up staying up until 6am once again as I simply couldn't sleep. I wrote my reply to Natasha though :)

I caught a couple of hours sleep before getting up at 11, getting ready, and walking to uni to return the camera I rented. I was shocked as the woman working there said "Cheers Ciall!" when I gave her the camera! :O That's the first time I've been referred to by name by any uni staff (including my teachers/lecturers). I actually felt like a human being. Heck, she probably read it from a screen or a piece of paper, but it made my whole day. I can't wait until I'm signed off on the Canon XL2.

...and it would do, as my day was utterly pointless and wasted. I got in, chilled for a bit and then slept through to 4pm. I got up, lazed about doing very little and eventually went to bed at midnight as I was bored witless.

Yeah. I've been sleeping lots during the day through pure boredom.

I awoke this morning at a very pleasant 1pm and had a great dream which I can't remember very well at all. And what have I done since I awoke? You guess it. Pretty much nothing.

Well, that's a bit of a lie. From when I woke up until about 4.30pm I did my script for Russell which had to be submitted by midnight tonight. I submitted extra early. What a geek.

But otherwise, done nothing.

I would go out tonight, but lack-of-ID is still killing me :(

It's 3am... so I decided to blog.

2011-11-10T02:58:00.000Z

It feels bizarre writing this at such an early hour of the morning, but hey ho, I'm up and doing things, so it felt right to slot in some time for blogging.

Yesterday was a moderately good day. I woke up in the morning, got myself ready for university and then headed to my first lecture with Russell. It would be out last for almost a month as he announced that we would be having tutorials pretty much up until the end of term for our scripts. Deadlines have now been set and I now have to get my first draft in by Friday. Joy.

Lecture was only an hour long and we were let go, so I went back to the flat, did a tiny bit of work, got myself something to eat and chilled, before heading off out for the second lecture of the day and my favourite of the week.

Barry told us all about what the Canon XL2 can do - and when I say tell us, he went through EVERY function on the camera and told us what it did - before we were allowed to play with them again. Me and Filip in our group were the only ones actually geeking out while the rest just sat and talked. I see it that if you're doing a technical course, you should be getting stuck in, being interested in the technical side of things and not waste your time and ultimately money doing nothing. Plus, geeking over cameras is awesome.

That was that, left, got in and chilled for most of the evening. I ended up chatting to Vicky for ages and Rob and Sarah got Domino's each, causing Sheonagh to REALLY want to get a pizza but needed somebody to share with her. After much persuasion (£8 for a pizza is a rip...and that's half price! I can get 2 weeks worth of shopping with that!), it was decided we'd get a pizza each and chill in my room and gossip.

And that we did. We gossiped for a while, then the pizza came and we gossiped for a while afterwards. It was great, and the time flew by. I had enough pizza left over to last me today too.

The rest of the evening was spent chilling and playing with the camcorder, recording some stuff to see how things would come out, and before I knew it, it was 3am and I attempted sleep...but failed. So I made the most of my lack-of-sleeplessness and took out the overflowing rubbish and recycling (as always), tided up the kitchen, did my minimal washing up and tidying my room. All this at about 4.30am.

It got to 6am and I decided it'd be worth getting a few hours kip before my lecture, so I did.

I awoke at 11ish, got ready for my lecture with Steve and headed off to it. We were in editing suits again and were supposed to edit footage, but instead we were given a lecture on the early history of editing and why cuts work. It was easy stuff which I knew already, and the rest of the session was Steve was Steve showing us the very, very basics of Final Cut Pro X which I think everybody knew...and he did it ever so slowly.

No editing done, but I got to leave 40 or so mins early. Not complaining.

Got in and Vicky told me she was off to get her belly-button pierced with Sheonagh and Vicky's friend Dan and asked if I wanted to go along. I had to go to Sainsbury's, so I thought why the heck not. We got there and Sheonagh decided she'd go Sainsbury's with me while they got it down. Went pound shops first before Sainsbury's where Sheonagh bought loads and I bought bread and two bowls :P

Walked back, chilled ever since. I did have a nap as I was exhausted from 7-11, which is probably why I am so awake right about now.

I also just finished watching a film called Bedrooms and Hallways. It's a film about homosexuality and prejudices, but it's done in quite a warming and light-hearted way. I didn't expect to like it as much as I did, and I really liked pretty much all of the characters, even if the performances of the cast were a bit over-the-top at times. It put a smile on my face :)

7/10

Need to return the camera in the morning. I should be able to get the Canon XL2 out in the next few days - yippee! I'm feeling...happier than I have been in the last few days.

Ignore the title of my last post...

2011-11-07T23:23:00.000Z

Saturday was quite a fun day in the end, which is strange. I'll go into more details about that night, Sunday and today after telling you about Friday evening/night/Saturday morning... It'll explain why this post is called "Ignore the title of my last post..."...

Friday Evening/Night/Saturday Morning

I couldn't sleep at all Friday evening. Not a wink. I think it may have been because from 8-11pm I napped by accident...

I was up most of the night deciding there was little point in attempting to sleep, so mainly watched TV stuff and listened to music. Eventually - at around 5.45am - I decided it would be wise to really try and and sleep.

And sleep I tried. At 6am, I heard the faint sound of an alarm going off in the block directly to the left of us (with me being at the end of our corridor, my room is next to a room in that block) and I was smug with joy that I hadn't been awakened at 6am by a fire alarm.

And then ours went off.

By God it sounded louder than normal, so I put some clothes on (well, jeans and shoes) and headed out, banging on everybody else's door as I did. Sarah - like me - was still awake and as we got outside we realised that it was a Sir Peter Hilton Court-wide fire alarm, and that all blocks' alarms had gone off.

400+ students outside in the cold, and there I was topless.

After 3 or 4 mins, the alarms stopped, we all ventured back in and I had a little go at Rob who only bothered to wake up after the alarm had finished. What a wonderful wake-up call for everyone - I told you why the title of my last post was now void... After staying up another 40 or so mins, I finally went to bed at 7am.

Saturday...Afternoonish...

After the somewhat late night I had a few hours previous, I was shocked to find I awoke at just before 1pm feeling quite refreshed. I had a shower and then, well didn't do much for a while. I mainly watched TV on iPlayer and dossed about.

Fireworks were in order - with it being the 5th November and all that - so me and Sarah decided we'd walk up to either the Student Union of Markeaton Park and watch them, meeting Rob up there who was awaiting his mate. On our walk, we (I say WE, it was me me... xD) decided we'd go to Markeaton park and watch them first hand.

It was incredibly packed, but there was more than enough space to gawp at the bonfire which was seemingly miles away from the crowd. You couldn't feel any warmth from it no matter how close to the barriers you got. Seeing 1,500+ people look at a fire seemed very Paganistic.

We waited for ages...and ages...and ages. Finally - about 15 mins after they were due to start - the fireworks started. Disappointingly poor bar the last 5 or so mins, me and Sarah decided to RAGEquit and head up to the SU. I took pictures, but they came out bad, so I shan't post them. Sowwy.

We walked to the SU and met up with Rob and a few friends from the gaming society and from Rob's course. After a few mins of awkwardness, we all decided to venture back to Markeaton Park and go to the small fair there. I was hoping for geekiness for some of the rides, but alas, there was none to be had :(

As we walked down and walked around, I begun chatting to the group. They seemed pretty awesome actually. A few of them went on a flat ride there and seemed positively shaken up, and before we knew it, we were walking to a pub to have a drink. Wonderful.

I initially wasn't going to have a pint, mainly as I had no ID and money I didn't want to be spending, but after Rob said he needed me to get one so he could pay on his card and the fact they were more than willing to accept my student ID, I found myself with a nice Bulmers over ice. Wonderful.

We all chilled around the pool tabel whiel some had a game or two. More chatting occured,w hichw as nice, and I felt...happy. We even watched some cage-type fighting too... such a weird thing to converse over. We chilled at a table for a while and chatted. It was nice. I felt I could be myself.

We decided we were hungry, so after a few left us, we walked back to Sir Peter Hilton so that Sarah could pick up some moneya nd then walked into town to get a McDonalds. I got myself a large McChicken Sandwich meal (with a free coke glass...and a cheeseburger [cheers Uni ID!]) and we all nommed away.

We walked people back, said our goodbyes and then walked back. Nice to meet you all - Luke, Yasmin, Stoyan, James, other James and Leanne :) It was a happy day for me, regardless of how good or not the fireworks were :P

Sunday

Sunday was a day which consisted of doing very little. In fact, the only things I can mention really were that 1) Sheonagh's boyfriend Cameron came to see Sheonagh, so I finally got to meet him. Nice guy. 2) Me and Sarah went shopping and I got bread, milk and KINDER! Yes - I found Kinder mini-choc bars for 99p in the 99p store :D And 3) I felt very stressed out about work, life and everything.

In fact, I didn't get to bed until gone 5am as I kept stressing. I have so much work to do at the moment and no idea how I'm going to do it. I need people to 'act' in my film, somebody to help with camera work and I also need to learn how to properly do a script as well as catch up on all of the journal entries I've missed. Seriously, we've been doing Scriptwriting for 2 months now and not had a single session on how to write a script, just on story, genre and stuff like that. I NEED TO KNOW THE FORMALITIES, ESPECIALLY IF YOU WANT MY 1ST DRAFT IN BY THIS WEEKEND!

So yeah, it was a hard night as I was thinking about life, what will happen after uni... heck, even marriage and children popped into my head. I don't want to talk anything more of last night - I seriously don't know what was on my mind.

Monday/Today
I woke up at about 9ish, then didn't do much as I felt really low. Like, seriously low. But I had to get dressed and head out as I needed to collect a camera from the equipment store.

Walked up to the store, got the camera (and bought a Mini DV tape too), walked back. Stopped off at the post boxes and picked up my costume for my film on the way too. Had a try on when I got in - it said one size fits all, but it's too short for me :(

I would post a picture, but I simply cannot be asked.

The rest of the day was spent doing little, before I went off to my lecture. We talked about auteur theory and then watched Twelve Monkeys. I'd been meaning to watch for a while, but kept putting off watching it. I have to say, it didn't meet my expectations. I was expecting more, and it didn't meet what I expected. It felt very 'average', which I know it isn't. Maybe I was just in the wrong frame of mind, but my mind was not blown and I do feel I need to rewatch it in a better mood.

7/10

Walked back feeling quite ill, rested, got something to eat and I'm feeling a little better now. Still feel down, but I can't do much to change that. My night will be spent doing work, I feel.

Alarms are no barrier when it comes to sleep...

2011-11-04T20:17:00.000Z

It appears this update is little less than a 2-day one. I have no idea why. I guess it's because by the tiem I bothered trying to write up what happened yesterday, I deemed it far too late to bother posting it, so decided to save it and come back to it today.

Anyway, before I get onto yesterday...

Wednesday evening after I'd written out my last post, I did very little and then tried sleeping. Sleeping failed, so instead I stayed up chatting to Sarah and Rob as everybody else - bar Sheonagh who was sleeping - had gone out. We chatted for ages and then decided we'd watch Scott Pilgrim vs The World. Much love for this film. We ended watching a good half of it before - at around 2am - Rob decided he was very sleepy and that he' much prefer to sleep over finishing the film. fair play, so he headed to bed.

Me and Sarah stayed up and I decided I'd do a few things to keep me occupied. The first thing id id was order a provisional license - it was much easier than I anticipated, and now all I need to do is sign a few forms and send in a few pictures (as far as I could tell). they should arrive in the post soon, and then bam: provisional.

I then started the arduous process of creating a spreadsheet allowing me to calculate and keep records of my budgeting and spending. I somewhat enjoyed that task at 2.30 in the morning, and ended up feeling satisfied enough with my efforts at just gone 3.30am, so decided bed would be a good option.

Thursday/Yesterday...

After the somewhat late evening the previous night, it was no surprise that I ignored my alarm the next morning and slept through until gone midday. I felt I deserved it, and I felt good knowing I slept through the cleaners arriving and cleaning the flat. I am one to try and avoid the awkward moment on walking into the kitchen while a poor cleaner cleans up the mess he presumes I - along with my flatmates - have all collectively made. Truth is, I actually clean up after myself and my flatmates leave most of the mess. He wouldn't know that. He's just judge.

The previous night, me and Sarah decided we'd go clothes shopping the next day. After all, I was in serious need of some new clothes and with money sitting comfortably in my bank and my finances worked out, I could afford to get a few new threads in.

Soon after awakening, I got myself ready and me and Sarah hit town. Primark was our first target, but before that it was Post Office times to get me some stamps. 3 stamps later (at a cost of just over £1), we left.

Primark was a short walk away, and after I endlessly searched the surprisingly and annoyingly small mens section, I'd found myself two new t-shirts with witty and comic slogans and images on. they'd do nicely. Sarah picked up a few jumpers from downstairs, and after browsing my unnecessarily strange obsession with colourful female socks, I picked up a couple of pairs of pig-designed girls socks for a small lump sum. A total of £8 spent in Primark. I was happy.

We then decided it would be a good idea to hit the charity shops and see what we could find. I'm one to give to charity when possible, and if that also meant finding a nice shirt or two out of it to, I'm not one to object to a bit of browsing. After collecting the mail, we headed off up town.

We hit Oxfam first. I found a few shirts I liked, however, they were a bit pricey so I decided I'd maybe come back later if I was still struggling to find something affordable and snazzy. One thing I do like about Derby which Milton Keynes is missing (apart from a high street) is a sizeable amount of accessible charity shops Thankfully, Derby has plenty, and we found quite a few on our travels.

In one, I found myself buying a copy of Russell Brand's "Booky Wook" for a pound. I may not be a fan of his, but the book seemed an admiral read, and for such good value I wasn't going to turn my nose up at it.

In another, I found a very nice -very cheap - shirt which I deemed a good addition to my wardrobe. That was purchased for a very reasonable £2.75.

Unsatisfied that I'd purchased all that I had wanted to, I ventured back to Oxfam and bought one of the shirts I'd spotted earlier. For £4.99, I was feeling a bit short of cash, but that feeling was undermined by the fact I had an awesome looking shirt.

Satisfied with my new-found possessions, I quickly headed to Tesco and got bottles of coke before me and Sarah walked back to the flat. Just under £18 was spent - stamps, 2 shirts, 2 t-shirts, 2 bottles of coke, 3 pairs of socks and a book later, I was happy.

The rest of the day was spent doing, well, very little. I think at one point I did some work (shocking, I know), purchased a costume on eBay for a film I will be shooting soon and maybe cooked some freeze-dried pasta in a sauce which was quite nom.

I also read one of my letters I received - it was a reply from Natasha :) It made me cry a little. I need to find some time to write back.

Yeah, that rest of my day was a bit naff. I even read some of my Jack Dee book too :O Wowza! I went to bed quite lateish I think. At well gone 2.30am...

Friday/Today...

After a late night, I was once again lazy and didn't get up until just gone midday. It's a habit I hope to be rid of over the course of this weekend and I have lots to do in terms of work, and I'd rather be waking up early and doing that than sleeping in.

So what have I done with today, I hear you ask? Well, I got the post (as I always do - nothing for me), did some work (shock, I know), caught up on some TV programmes and then this afternoon I watched a film.

I watched Spirited Away. I was in awe at the animation - it was simply beautiful. I've got a lot of Studio Ghibili films I've been wanting to watch for a while, but this topped the list. the story was bizarre at times and yet still sweet. It never got boring and it was very flowing. Just a beautifully made film.

8.5/10

Watched some more TV, put a meal into the microwave and here I am now writing this. Today hasn't been as fun as yesterday, but hey ho, tomorrow won't be either (well, not until evening if all goes to plan).

We Need To Talk About Kevin - Wow, just wow.

2011-11-02T21:25:00.000Z

See, I told you I'd get back into a routine! Here I am, just shy of 24-hours since I last posted. Back to the good old times.

Right, what did I get up to today...

Well, I woke up a lot later than I anticipated at about 11ish. I had my alarm set for 9.30, but I felt I deserved a bit more sleep - after all, I'd worked my arse off yesterday in my lectures. So when I eventually got up, I found myself doing what I normally do at uni... sitting doing nothing on the laptop.

After a few hours of that had passed, I eventually decided to get dressed and look a lot more presentable. I went down and collected the post - like I do every weekday - and found no mail for me, but one for Rob. I then got ready to head out and go to the cinema.

Walked over to QUAD. Collected my ticket, went up to the screens, waited a few minutes and then eventually went in. I watched We Need To Talk About Kevin. I'd been looking forward to watching this for a while now, especially as Lynne Ramsey hasn't released much for a while, although I know she's been fighting to do films which have been somewhat destroyed by other directors... I have the book, but I'm yet to read it. But wow. Wow. The film is immaculately filmed, edited and the performances from all main cast are almost faultless. It's a very well crafted film, certainly not one for somebody who wants to chill on a Friday evening. Incredibly chilling and I have a feeling it'll be playing on my mind for some weeks to come. One of the best from 2011 so far.

8.5/10

I then decided it was best I went to main Sainsbury's in Westfield and get a few bits and bobs. A pizza for dinner, jam, marmalade, bread, mayonnaise... but no eggs - they were out :( So after I paid for all of that, i walked to Tesco and picked up a pack of the cheapest eggs I could find, which of course had to be caged hen eggs. I feel terrible buying them - I really do - but I am a student on a very tight budget, and at £2 for 10, that was a stretch as it was, let alone paying £3.50+ for ones I'd feel happier with.

Walked back and popped my eggs on to boil - I was going to make egg mayonnaise :) While they boiled, I did all of my washing up, which I have been putting off doing for a few days. I keep all my washing up in my room so that I feel more urgency to do it - my room is always clean. Peeled the shells off, cut up eggs, put mayonnaise in, stirred, refrigerated. Lovely. Put my pizza on, took pizza out, ate pizza and chilled in front on the laptop.

Caught up on a little bit of TV, generally dossed about, and here I am now. That was my day.

SORRY, SORRY, SORRY, SORRY FOR NEGLECTING YOU BLOG! D:

2011-11-01T22:25:00.000Z

I'm sorry I've not posted in so, so long :(

Across the whole of October, I only posted 3 times which is dreadful, and I feel bad as now I can't remember most of what I have done this month.

What makes it worse for me is that - on an average month - I get about 2,500-3,000 views across the blog, which is small but enough for me to be satisfied I have an 'audience' and that I must continue doing this to satisfy you - my 'audience'. This dropped to just 1,321 last month, more than a thousand down on normal. And this may seem selfish or bad, but you see those adverts dotted around the blog? Well, every click I get on them earns me a couple of pennies, and if I get enough clicks I get a wonderful cheque sent to me. Being a student, that'll help me out a lot, so more views = more potential people who click the adverts and more money I could earn :P

1,300ish views is bad in my eyes, but then again, that just shows that even though I've only posted 3 times, I can still get very high view counts, so cheers guys :)

I'm going to be honest - once again - I can't remember much of what I have done since my last post. I will, repeat will be more consistent in my posts again. Now that things are settling down and I have a more structured routine here, I will be able to find time every night or every two nights to get everything down and post it for you, my audience.

As I can't remember everything that I did in the time since my last post, I shall write down the main things that I can remember happened as well as do the reviews for all the films I have watched. In fact, I'll do them first. prepare for a barrage of film reviews :P

Right, first up is Buster Keaton's College. I absolutely LOVE Buster Keaton silent films. He is without doubt my favourite actor/director from the silent-film era. College is far off of his best, and yet it still provided endless jokes and the charm and wit of his films shines through. However, the humour does die a little and the film hasn't got the overall uniqueness that makes most other Buster Keaton films - such as The General and Sherlock Jr. - shine through.

7/10

I watched Blade Runner with Sarah one night. I think it's one to watch again, mainly as I don't think I was able to watch it and absorb all of its beauty. It's a stunning looking film and the story was very interesting, but unfortunately it didn't get my full concentration throughout so I may have missed bits which would have made the film make more sense. But I love the tech-noir elements. Very nom.

8/10

I watched Citizen Kane with a very open mind. Not knowing as much about it as perhaps a film fan like me should, I was looking forward to seeing why many consider it one of the best films ever made. I think I now know why. It is crafted magnificently. Everything from the way it was shot to the story structure and narrative is so unique and wonderful. It's fresh - and that's something coming from an 18 year old in 2011. It made me go 'wow', and all films that do that tend to end up in my top 20. This slots in right in the middle at 10 on my list. Classic, magnificent.

10/10

I watched Half Nelson with Samantha when she came and stayed (more on that later in the post). I'd no idea what it was about, and maybe that was the downfall of the film. It looked like it would have a very deep, perhaps disturbing storyline as the film developed, and yet it never amounted to nothing. I saw a relationship build between the teacher and the student, but it never went further than being 'friends'. I felt I'd been robbed of maybe a naughty-naughty teacher-student story, or maybe even soft drug usage by them both... it just never amounted to anything. Disappointing. But otherwise, solid acting, a refreshing film.

6.5/10

The other day i started on Krzysztof Kieślowski's Three Colours Trilogy. I've been meaning to watch them for a while, and I finally found copies of each, so I sat over three consecutive nights and watched the films.

First up was Three Colours: Blue. A great start to the series showing real emotion from the protagonist and displaying its theme explicitly and very well. The film - like the rest of the series - isn't for the traditional film viewer, it is for film fans. It's an intelligent film which requires not blank observation, but thought, depth and leaves you carrying something away with you. It certainly did that to me.

8/10

Three Colours: White was equally as brilliant as Blue. Similar parallels between the two films begun to show through and this would continue into Red. This was strangely comic, a contrast from Blue and a nice change. Once again, brilliance.

8/10

Three Colours: Red was my favourite of the three, and in my eyes was the better. I felt a lot more emotion in this film towards the protagonist and was saddened by the end of the film. It had a perfect conclusion to the series showing all the protagonists in the way it does (not going to spoil it) and I genuinely loved the story and its developments. DO NOT WATCH THIS FILM WITHOUT WATCHING BLUE AND WHITE! It is a film to be marvelled at in a beautiful trilogy. Masterpiece.

8.5/10

So yeah, those are the films I watched since my last post... got plenty more to come over the next few days, don't worry ;)

So, I guess I should highlight the stuff I've done since my last post? Well, a lot of it involves blood, so if you're squeamish, feel free to skip over those bits. If not, do read them as they do explain a lot and make for a good read - I hope :P

First off, I should say that my passport is well and truly lost. I went back to see whether anybody had handed in, and the kind woman said that about 20-30 mobiles were stolen that night and the chances of it being handed in were pretty much nil, which is a shame. I mean, I dunno what people can do with my ID, but I guess it's very little. It's just a bummer for me as I now have to fork out just shy of £80 for a replacement.. I have, however, decided I will be getting a provisional license too so I can carry that around instead of my passport. And heck, who knows, I may want to take driving lessons in a few years too :|

Oh yes, did I tell you about my £50 rail-ticket windfall? No? Well, I will do now. I book my train tickets now through a site called Red Spotted Hanky. It's basically The Train Line but without booking fees at all, plus you earn points which can be used to get money off train journeys or donated to charity. Anyway, I follow them on Twitter too, as I do with about 470 other companies/celebs/friends. They randomly decided that some people who follow them should get £50 of free train tickets, and they selected me at random out of the 15,000+ people who follow them. So I've now got £50 worth of train tickets to use by the end of 2011 :) Saves me paying out loads to visit MK and mother :D

BUT, my winnings don't end there. Oh ho no they don't. I also won a We Need To Talk About Kevin book from Derby QUAD simply for emailing my name and address to them. It was unexpected and a lovely surprise when it came in the post a week and half or so ago. I'm off to watch We Need To Talk About Kevin tomorrow as I decided the film is hailed as equally as high as the book and there was no way I'd finish the book in a week. Much looking forward to it, then I'll crack on with the book :)

Speaking of books, I found a bargain at the 99p Store the other day. Jack Dee's autobiography - Thanks For Nothing - was for sale, hardback for 99p! Bargain! It should be £20, and looking around elsewhere, it's being sold for about a tenner there. I snapped it up. It had a small tear in outside cover, but nothing major. I would have picked up another copy, but it appeared to be the only copy left. Oh well, for 99p, I shan't complain. It's making for a very good read so far :D

99p Store is my favourite at the moment. The other day I picked up a large A5 diary/planner for 2012 with a lovely hardback cover for 99 pennies. It's not AMAZING, but you'd pay £8 or £9 at WHSmith for one pretty much the same, so I'll take that thank you :P I know what you're thinking: "Getting a 2012 organiser in October?! He's so organised!" - Yes, yes you're right, I am.

Anyway, Mother came up to see me last week. I finished my lecture at just before 7pm, so I met her at about 7.15ish and she'd managed to find her way around Derby and to me. We spent most of the evening talking and chilling - I cooked her dinner. It was student curry, named so as the curry sauce cost 17p :P The sauce is lovely though :) We ate that, chilled, and the ended up going to bed, or more so mother did. She snored a lot and my 'bed' for the evening was a very hard floor and a single duvet, which I wrapped around me. It wasn't comfy at all, and I literally got not one wink of sleep at all.

In the morning, we had to move mothers car from its position the night before to one where it was affordable to stay for a few more hours. This simply involved moving the car around 30 yards into a gravel car-park..but mother decided that she's take the car for a spin...and then try and go up Derby's busiest one-way street during morning rush hour the WRONG WAY! Thank goodness I wasn't in the car, I would have had major RAGE, but somehow she avoided getting hit face on by another car and was parked. It was a strange start to the day which would only get worse, trust me.

Mum stayed for a few hours more, so I took her around Derby city centre, showed her the sights before she departed back off home. She was the first person I've had in my room for a period of longer than 3 mins since I moved in. Strange. She left me a big box of student goodies, such as tins of tuna, pasta, soup, noodles and... a chicken and mushroom pie in a tin...? :|

I had lectures, got in and decided that I would give this tinned pie a whirl. I tried opening it with a tin opener - which the instructions clearly stated I should do. I'd broken one tin opener, and gone through 2 others and the tin was open at some points and not others. It simply hated tin openers. Consulting my flatmates, it was decided that the next option was to knife and saw through the bits not currently open. I agreed to do this, and I put a lot of my strength into getting through the tin. It was a success, and the tin was opened!...

...with the expense of my left wrist.

The force of me getting into the tin, and the sudden 'breakthrough' meant I had literally no time to move away my left wrist from holding the tin and away from the sharpest knife's path, and I ended up slashing my wrist. Blood poured, and poured into a pool on the floor before I could clasp a hand to it to stop the blood. I called calmly to my flatmates for help, although they were quite reluctant to come in, so I told them it was urgent. Sarah and Vicky came in, Sarah saw the blood gushing from my wound and through my fingers so we calmly wrapped a towel around the wound and help it up as much as possible to stop the flow. Vicky was gone - she wasn't all too keen on seeing so much blood, and understandably.

Sarah was a complete and utter babe throughout :) Being first aid trained, she knew exactly what to do and was very calm about it all, which meant I was able to reduce the amount of blood I lost and also remained very calm. Weirdly, cutting myself with a very, very deep gash on my wrist didn't hurt one small bit at all, which I found bizarre. We called the flat emergency number as I deemed it unnecessary to need an ambulance or to go to hospital, and they at first told me Sarah to take me don to the office. They couldn't comprehend how serious the injury was. They eventually came up and we decided no stitching was required as we acted quickly, so we cleaned it up and put a massive pad on it. The cut in total was about 2 inches big, and the lower end of the cut was about three quarters of an inch deep, but thanks to Sarah, I'm still here living the tale :P

It was really fun...seriously. That sounds sort of emoish, but I enjoyed the whole experience and if it ever happened again, I'd welcome it. It was the best 30 minutes of university by far.

Yep, that defo sounds emoish.

Anyway, after all that drama, I cooked the pie and it was delicious. Most definitely worth near-accidental suicide. It's healing very, very well. I think I shall have a nice scar to show for it too...

And the next day I walked to Derby train station and picked up Samantha :) I'd missed her, so so so much, so we hugged lots and lots and got the unibus back to mine :) We sat and chilled for a while before heading up town - got a McDonalds where I accidentally shouted "The bastards put ice in my Coke!" when I sat down...right next to the manager... and a child. I felt awful, but the manager was nice and so was the mother of the child. Why is it that I say the most awkward of things in McDonalds? :P

Got in, chilled some more, ordered a pizza each and garlic bread and then sat and watched Half Nelson before Skyping Josh :) It was a fun night, and Samantha insisted on sleeping on the floor which she said was quite comfy. I'm not sure.

The next day we headed up town to see what we could find for her Halloween costume - ended in various places including Ann Summers. It was fun, but exhausting and soon after got back, Samantha was picked up by her dad. It was lovely for her to come up and see me - I miss her already :(

Other than that, not done much since. I gave blood on Sunday. That was fun, as always. New venue, new places to be, new way of doing it. It was very busy, so it took more than an hour for em to be even seen to, but I gave my bit and pumped a good pint out of me. I dunno why, but I chose my right arm this time. Bad mistake - I couldn't type or do much with it for the rest of the day. 4 months to go until I can donate again ^_^

I've had a lot of time off of lectures recently as my lecturers have all been working on feature films, so I had no lecture yesterday and I will have none tomorrow. So today was my only lecture day of the week, followed by 6 days off...again. I have a lot of work to do between now and next lecture though, trust me.

Today was a good day though. My student finance FINALLY came through this morning, so I now feel much better about being able to spend money, although I still won't. I've set a maximum budget of £30 per week, which is more than manageable. Of course, things like passports and stuff are excluded from that, but between today and the 1st September, if I stick to my budget, I'll only be spending £880 out of the £2,900 maintenance grant I've received. £200 of that has paid off my debt with the bank (overdraft) and the rest will pay back mother, but yeah, I can live on that.

The day got better as both lectures were great today. Russell's lecture ended an hour early and we watched short films in his lesson, one of which I'd seen before. Then after my break, I had my favourite lecture of the week with Barry. We looked at the Canon XL2 today which is quite nom.

That's it, basically.

❤ Nero ❤ Natasha ❤

2011-10-21T16:53:00.001+01:00

Here, have part 2 of this catch-up session.

Monday

I had a goo amount of sleep during the night, which was great. I awoke, chatted on the interwebz, collected the post (as I do every day for our flat out of choice) and then got ready for my only lecture of the day in the evening.

Walked over to Brittania Mill and popped DVDs back into the library and took 3 more out for weekend viewing. Headed over to the lecture where started off by finishing off the film we watched 2 weeks ago. Micmacs was very enjoyable. Gripping storyline, great humuour and the style was very much Amelie which was directed by the same director - Jean-Pierre Jeunet. A good mix of the old, traditional idea in the story and modern times.

7.5/10

We then talked about the mise en scene in groups before talking as a whole class. We then started on something called semiotics which seems simple enough but is very complex. We did a lot on that and I suspect we'll be doing a lot more on it next week too. My brain was quite fried by the end of the lecture, which can only mean I'm learning and being challenged, which is good, right?

I walked home shattered, cooked myself some dinner, chilled and then was invited over to Charlotte's upstairs to meet Rose whom I have had on Facebook for ages. She's lovely, and we all had a good time chatting and talking to one of Rose's ex's on Facebook :P I was there until just before 10ish.

Headed back, stuck on my Jimmy Carr DVD which had arrived (seen it before, just now owned it - I now own all 6 Jimmy Carr DVDs :D) and then tried sleeping, which of course, ended in failure.

Tuesday

Tuesday will always be known as 'Lecture Day' as it's the only day I have 2 lectures on, and have 6 hours altogether of them...

Woke up, got ready and headed straight over to Russell's lecture for scriptwriting. We looked a lot at character and genre, so analysed a lot of short films and segments from film to see what we can tell from character just by simple things like what they said, what they were wearing and the way the camera shows them. I was amazed at what I picked up from segments which were as short as 20 seconds long.

During the break, Russell put on a short film called Six Shooter by the director of In Bruges. It was brilliant, very dark and very witty - a real good watch if you have 30 or so mins spare and don't mind the dark comic styling of the film.

Went home for my hour gap between lectures - cooked soup and had that, then headed pretty much straight back for my second lecture, although this wasn't much of a lecture as we were out doing in camera editing shooting which I did in Film Studies last year before we started our short films. It was much harder this time around though and I dunno why. We'd planned it all last week, so all we had to do was go out and shoot it, but the guys I was working with messed around a lot and it took over an hour for us to get our first shot done...and even the, we had to re-do it. I took the camera as I'd not done any filming since I'd got to Derby and offered to share around, but everyone was happy with me to continue shooting it all.

We eventually finished it and headed in as we were a bit cold. the last bit didn't record well at all, so it looks terrible and doesn't make sense, but hey ho, that's why only silly people (and even then, I know of nobody) do in camera editing. We'll be showing everyone next week :P

Got in, chilled for the evening and then managed to get a good hour or so of sleep, which was great.. and then I was awoken by a high Jonathan and his mate, as well of Sheonagh and Vicky who were laughing at them. To make matters worse, they decided it would be HILARIOUS to turn the hoover on outside my room to wake up everybody who was sleeping...not once, but twice -_- I had major RAGE at them and swore a lot, but they ignored me. It wasn't until Rob said he was off to bed did they actually stop... I wasn't happy, but they've all apologised since.

Wednesday

Last lecture of the week is always on Wednesday's. 3 days is too little. I'd rather have a lecture pretty much every day at 9am, at least then I get stuff done with the rest of my day...

Anyway, woke up, got ready, headed off to Steve's lecture. We were all sharing our videos we made last week and they were all really good. I was so proud when I saw our group's video shown to everyone - so pleased with it. We then started presenting our ideas to the rest of the class... one by one, 2 mins each, judged by a panel of our own peers. I was on the first panel and got to ask questions.

We did this for about 2 hours and I was one of the last to present my idea. I swore a lot when presenting mine and I got the most questions and laughs than anybody else did in theirs - I guess people were engaging with my idea :P I won't let you know what it is yet as I was it to be a nice surprise when it's finally made ;)

When I got in, I did a lot of catching up with emailing people and such. I also had a talk with Taylor about a few things. That was my evening basically.

Thursday

Yesterday was a good day. A very good day. In fact, it ended with the realisation it could be an awful day, but I haven't even let that get me down at all.

I awoke at around 10am and I was fully awake, but I realised the cleaners were in and I did't want to have awkward "oh hai!" moments, so I went back to sleep thinking I'd awake in an hour or so... but I awoke at just before 1pm instead :P I spent most of my day time doing little - just chilling and thinking about the events of the evening, for in the evening I was off to see Nero with Rob :) I did get a few pictures, but they're not great, so one of two are stolen from Rob... ;)

We left at just before 6ish so that we could collect our tickets from the box office - standing, of course. Walked there, picked them up and then had time to spare, so went for a wander around town as it was late night shopping. Went to Tesco where I bought cheap chocolate, then hit the shopping centre and went to Game and Cex just browsing, before heading back to join a humongous queue outside the Assembly Rooms. It was a bit cold, but I was absolutely fine. It's been 'cold' a lot since I've been here, and yet I've hardly felt it. Weird.

After a good 25 mins or so, we finally were being let in. Rob headed straight for the toilets and after he'd done what he needed to do, we went to the floor and got a pretty decent view of the warm-up DJ act - The Hype Collective. They were pretty good, certainly started getting the crowd moshing and going.

Rob needed a drink, so I went and bought it for him while he chilled. He guzzled that and we went back just in time to see the dubstep beat-boxer Reeps One. He has an amazing talent, and for the first 10 mins you're amazed, but after that, it just gets a bit boring.

We then had a half an hour wait for Nero. The venue can hold 1,400 people standing and 600 sitting, but I'd say there was only about 500 people standing and 30 or so people sitting - quite empty for such a high profile gig. Not complaining, it was intimate with the feeling of a large arena gig.

We'd managed to find ourselves quite well placed, but as soon as it started we knew we may be split and kicked the crap out of. Then it started. Then I started moshing. then I found myself 2 people from the front and Rob did too. Nero were simply amazing - I was singing and moshing along all night. I'm so glad they played Reaching Out too as it's one of my favourite tracks from the album and I thought it'd be missed. They even played some of their pre-album material which was amazing live and a few remixes. All in all, they were pretty amazing. More than worth the £15 tickets.

We left dripping with sweat and a couple of bruises, when I realised that my passport had gone. Rob told me that he saw somebody pick it up, try to pass it over to me and was going to hand it in, so I decided that I'd go back the next day and see if it's been handed in. I would be well and truly f**ked if it was lost as it's my only form on ID, cost me a crap load of money and would mean I wouldn't be able to buy alcohol, go out, go to the cinema, buy some DVDs... just loads of stuff.

We went to McDonalds and picked up a drink each and started to head back home. What a night. It only got better when I got in...

I had a miscall on my phone. I assumed it was perhaps the venue trying to contact me as they had my contact details, so I used Rob's phone to call them. Now, remember a few posts ago I said I sent a letter to a somebody I missed dearly... well, I can tell you now who I had sent it to. My bestest ever friend Natasha who I have know literally all my life. I've not been able to see her for many, many, many years as she's not been 'good', although she's fine in every sense of being fine. So she'd received my letter, written one back and gave me a ring. I wasn't expecting it and it was lovely. I may have cried a lot and not known what to say as I was in shock/joy, but just hearing her voice again was lovely. She couldn't talk for long, but I'm determined to see her as soon as I can :) That made my day. That made my week. That made my month.

I then spent a lot of the evening on Chatroulette with Vicky and her friend Lorna. We got chatting to this one guy called Gustavo for a good 40 or so mins. He seemed nice, although he rarely spoke and he had no cam :/

That is that. I'll do today's update in my next post.

❤ Kate McGill ❤ Alton Towers ❤

2011-10-20T15:53:00.000+01:00

This post should be much more positive and less ranty than my previous post, which can only be good, I hope. This'll be part 1 of a 2 parter post I think - this one is the good, happy days, the other post the not so happy one. So yeah, let's see what I've been up to these last few days...

Friday started with severe lack-of-sleep once again. I didn't manage to get to bed until around 8am after tossing and turning for many hours, and then I woke up at 12 as I didn't want to waste my day. But then again, most of what I did on Friday could be classed as a bit of a waste of a day... I mainly watched TV catch-ups and listened to music.

However, in the evening I popped into town with Sarah as we both fancied treating ourselves to something sweet. We headed to Tesco, found ourselves in the sweeties and biscuits aisle and treated ourselves. I got a few packs of cheap biscuits and I got my second trifle since I've been here :) Spent a couple of pennies over £2 for it all - not bad, especially as the biscuits will last me all week (probably).

Walked back, watched some more TV catch-up programmes and then attempted sleep at midnight having been virtually unsuccessful the previous few days. This was no exception. So, after an hour+ of trying and failing, I watched more TV, whipped out my Gameboy SP and had a go at a few things on there and then tried again. I did get soome sleep, but it wasn't 'heavy' sleep, so I was still shattered the next morning.

Saturday

I got up at just after 1pm as I really needed the sleep, albeit it being very 'light'. Today would be a good day, so I got myself ready. "Why would it be a good day?" I hear you ask yourself, well, I was off to see Kate McGill perform in Derby ❤ Sarah had kindly said she'd come along with me otherwise I'd have been on my own and been so 'vewy ronry', but just 15 mins before we'd agreed to leave, she was still snoozing :P However, she got up and somehow managed to shower, get ready and leave within 20 mins - impressive.

We walked into town to Caffe Nero where Kate would be performing. I already had a digital copy of her album, but I wanted a physical copy too which came with a book so that Kate could sign it. It was £7 and there was only one left - I had to have it. Thankfully, as we gradually made our way to the front of the queue, I was able to take it before somebody else did. I also got a free drink with my CD, so I picked a large hot chocolate (which cost £2.90) meaning the CD itself cost me £4.10 - nice :) Here, have a picture of the CD/album:

We found ourselves some seats and then Kate and her tour people arrived. They started setting up in a really small, tight corner, so all us McThrillers moved around to try and get a glimpse. I had to sit on a table next to some randomers before deciding sitting on the floor would be much better. Sarah wasn't fussed and stayed on a table just a bit back, bless her.

And then Kate started.

It was amazing! She said she had a throat like a cheese grater, but you'd never have known. I was singing along quietly to myself too so to not make an embarrassment to myself :P I literally had eargasms :)

She sung for about 40 mins and yet it felt like 10. It was amazing. Afterwards, we all waited while they packed up and then Kate met us all, so we all queued. I joked about with a few of them before I finally got to meet Kate :)

I was nervous, so first thing I said was "I'm sorry, I don't quite know what to say" and she was like "Aww". I then remembered Earle, Juris and David all wanted me to pass a message onto her, so I said "Oh, my friends wanted me to say something - when you were at Birmingham, do you remember some Asians? They were the only Asians there..." and she laughed and said yeah, so I said "Well, they're my mates from 6th form and they asked me to see if you remembered them" and she said "It was one of their birthdays, wasn't it?" and I said yeah, and she said "Awww, he was so shy and so cute. I signed one of their guitars but I was nervous about it as I didn't want to sign somewhere awkward or ruin the guitar" and we had a chuckle. I said "Well, we're all from MK and I'm also going to ask if you could come to Milton Keynes on your next tour - we'll all be your groupies at the front and it'd be awesome!" She laughed and said "Haha, that sounds like a plan. I'm defo going to try and go Milton Keynes then!" and then she signed my album :D I explained to her my awkward name and how it's Irish Gaelic and she said that's good as my name is unique, and then I gave her a hug, had a picture while we were laughing and then gave her another hug and said I'll see you again soon, and she said "Nice to meet you Ciall. Defo see you again soon!" :) It was magical ♥

I left such a happy man - mucho love for Kate McGill :)

Sarah needed to pop to Tesco on our way back, so we did :) She needed spices, but not until we'd been a bit immature and had a play with them :P

I also picked up doughnuts while I was there as I felt like doing so :) On our way back to the flat, we were talking about how much we love finding new, unknown singers and rather randomly and perfectly a guy approached us and said he was looking to get his music out and wondered if we fancied a free CD. Of course we both took one and I must say I was pleasantly surprised at what it was :) His name is David Lacey and his style is sort of alternative-indie. It's actually quite good and has great potential :) Me and Sarah were both very happy chappies :)

I got in, posted all over Facebook about Kate and Kate even tweeted me after I mentioned her in my picture of me and her :) I was chuffed :) I chilled for a bit, went to Tesco again with Sarah where we both picked up a cider each as a treat to top off an awesome day. Got in, cooked my dinner and a snack for Alton Towers the next day, had a shower and then chilled with my cider over ice.

I thought the alcohol would help with my insomnia, but I don't think it made any effect :/ I was up ALL NIGHT not being able to sleep. Literally did not have a wink at all. In the end, I gave up sleeping and realised that I had to be up in 2 hours so decided to watch the sunrise and decorate my walls with all of my ORPs I have collected over the years.

Sunday

Sunday starts exactly where Saturday left off. I was still awake and got ready for Alton Towers. Because of stupid train times, there was no train to Uttoxeter at the time I needed to get there, so my only option to get to Alton was to get the AT Bus from Derby up to Alton itself, then grab a ride to Uttoxeter and train it back. So, I had to leave very early in the morning, walk to the train station, pick up my train ticket, wait for the bus and then bus it to Alton. Because of this, I ended up leaving at just before 9am. A 20 min walk across town to the train station occurred where I was able to pick up my pre-booked tickets before going to the bus stop and waiting for the bus.

I'll add at this point that I took NO pictures on Sunday whatsoever. Seen Alton too many times, plus I generally couldn't be bothered.

It was chilly, but I only had to wait around 15 mins for the bus. It cost me just under £7 for a one-way ticket on top of the £7ish for the one-way train ticket too. A bit of a rip off, and if they actually operated a Derby-Uttoxeter train service, it'd have only cost me £7.50 plus a £3 bus trip to get from Derby to Alton and back. Oh well.

Bus arrived, sat on it as it took a stroll to Alton. Quite a number of chavs on it, not as much as the chav bus at Thorpe. It arrived just as I got a phone call from Neal asking where to meet up. I planned on meeting with Neal, Mysterious Sue and Will at the corkscrews and they had a small walk to go yet, so I stood around awaiting their arrival.

They arrived, we headed straight in (Neal got me in on his Merlin Magical Staff pass for free - thanks Neal!) and Sue required toilet times, so me, Meal and Will all headed to the Alton shop to lark about and look at things, which was great fun. Neal found a hat he loved and we found a number of personalised named dinosaurs :P

After Sue was done, we all walked over to Nemesis - my beauty. We did it twice - firstly at the front, and then back row. We headed over to Air to get that over a done with. We decided to do that front row as the front row queue was tolerable and none of us had done Air front row for a while.

We then decided to walk over towards Hex via the gardens. Epic fun times were had there, so we got distracted, but eventually found ourselves at a walk-on Hex. Hex is always fun. We stopped for food, but decided that we'd walk over to the food court near the entrance and get food there. In all honesty, I'd never been in there before, so it was nice to see some of 'Towers which I'd never seen. I ate my pasta, teh guys got themselves tasty (but expensive) meals.

While we were here, we decided we'd go and see 'The Ghost of the Sea' at the Sea Life. After Neal got a bit carried away with shrimp cleaning his hands, we saw Ghost of the Sea. It was epic. We then decided for some reason to do The Flume - it may have been because Sue had never done it before. Wet times occurred... VERY wet times, and not the good kind of wet.

We walked over to Oblivion and did that - a short wait, but we were on and off quickly. Mucho love to Oblivion. Toilet times occurred followed by Terror of the Towers queue. The queue was quite quick and we were on in about 20-25 mins. We were grouped with youngish girls who insisted that 2 of us go in front of them and 2 behind. Me and Neal went behind, Sue and Will (both of whom had never done ToTT before) went in front. Terror of the Towers still remains my favourite theme park scare maze that I have done. The length of it, the detail, the general fun of it all... it just hasn't been beaten yet in my books. the girls were screaming their heads off the whole way through :P We exited, did a survey and then departed once again for the loos.

We then took the skyride over to Forbidden Valley and walked down to Duel, but it was broken :( But we saw Family_Furie, so said hey and chilled with Phil for a while. Not seen them in a while, so was good to have a quick catch-up. Duel re-opened, so we all had a quick go. I got 55,000 points dead. I need to keep track of what is my high-score...

Chilled with family_furie for a while more before we all split and we headed off to Nemesis. We did it single rider 3 times each, which was great fun. We walked over to the Dark Forest - on our way we saw a very large congregation of people outside the walkway through the Towers. they were - in PC terms - travellers who had descended on the park in large numbers. We'd seen groups of them around the park all day. the girls were hardly wearing anything and were as orange as Tropicana, the guys were short and had slick-back hair and they were all congregating in numbers of well over 100, blocking access to The Dark Forest. It was hard to walk though them.

We did Rita single rider as it was non-existent and then headed to The Woodcutter to eat (again, never been there). I didn't have food as it was expensive, but I still had my pasta, so nommed on a lot of that. Fit waitress times ftw!

It was finally dark, so Th13teen times were needed. I've never had to queue for Th13teen, so this was my first experience of doing so. 25 mins later, we were on. Th13teen is made for days like that - dark. It was much better in the dark than it has ever been. A shame that it'll only ever bet that way for 2 weeks of the year...

It was after this we realised our plan for the rest of the evening and had to rush to get it all done. Sue was called "an impatient young lady" which is shocking as she's 28. This was when gypo times occurred. We caught the end of a massive fight outside Hex/ToTT with around 70 travellers involved. We had to fight our way through just to exit. It turns out all that the gypsies did all evening was abuse staff, assault members of staff, fight and cause damage. Eugh. Idiots. It made Alton feel like Thorpe, and not in a good way.

We headed to Oblivion only to find it was broken, so did the Zombie Walk through nearby. It wasn't that bad actually, better by far than Thorpe's failure of a walk through last year. We then took a walk over to Forbidden Valley via the gardens...in the pitch black. It was nervy for me as it felt like I would be assaulted at any moment - I blame the tense atmosphere in the park. Somehow we made it over safe, but when we got there some guy 'joked' about mugging us. Idiot.

We did Air 'cause there was no queue, then whored Nemesis. It had just started to rain too, meaning Nemesis was running VERY fast and was simply amazing! We did once front, 4 times back row and finally on the final train of the day, we did front row. It was amazing! Neal and Will only did a few of the times, but me and Sue whored until we were sore.

One of the better days I have had at Alton, although every day at Alton is amazing. We walked back to the entrance and then to the cars swiftly so that I could catch my train. Said bye to everybody.

Ride Count:

Nemesis x11
Air x2
Hex x1
Sea Life x1
The Flume x1
Oblivion x1
Terror of the Towers x1
Duel x1
Rita x1
Th13teen x1
Zombie Walk-through x1

Will kindly gave me a lift to Uttoxeter where I caught my single-carriage train back to Derby. Got to Derby station, walked home, got in and tried sleeping. It was a success!

I'll do the rest of the catch-up days soon...