2009, Week 14 & 15

I can't work out whether my posting has slowed down due to a) not doing anything interesting to write about or b) me being too lazy to be bothered. I think it's mostly laziness, which ironically is the reason for me not having anything interesting to write about. Not having anything interesting to write about has never stopped me before though I suppose?

Our house is pretty ugly, but I like to think its oddness is part of its charm. Who else can say they have a 2 x 3 meter room attached to their bedroom that is referred to as 'the void' on the blueprints? It's especially ugly from the front, an 80's affront to architectural beauty, with no redeeming features and an afterthought of an extension. It's our house though and I love it. I think I have a lot in common with it; born in 1982, aesthetically odd and probably vastly over valued.

There are two weeks of the year when the house does look marginally attractive, when the tree in our front garden blossoms. To counter that I have to spend two weeks driving around in a Skoda covered in girly pink petals.




This week I finished reading 'Book of the Dead', the complete history of zombie cinema. It's a book I've been wanting to buy for ages and was well worth the wait. For example, did you know there are zombie films named 'Urban Scumbags vs. Countryside Zombies' (German), 'Space Zombie Bingo' (Troma) and 'Nudist Colony of the Dead'. Ironically, the next book on my list to read is the 'Tibetan Book of Living and Dying'. Sounds similar, but it probably doesn't give any analysis on the implicit social commentary of 'Dawn of the Dead'.

I very rarely watch a film that affects me emotionally, and I watch alot of movies. The last film that caught me off guard was United 93. Before I'd watched the film I was very cynical of the whole idea, I couldn't believe that hollywood could tell the story in a tasteful and non-exploitative way. By the end of the film I was mentally and, to a degree, physically destroyed. I don't know why but I can feel when a film's got to me, normally about 10 minutes before the emotional crescendo that has been building through out the film peaks. When the film does reach it's inevitable climax it's like a punch to the stomach. And it makes me well up a bit.

Last week I watched 'Waltz with Bashir' and it completely bowled me over, much like United 93. It's amazing filmmaking and I think pretty groundbreaking for an animation (more so than any Pixar film of late). If you read this, please go watch Waltz with Bashir and United 93. If you're lucky there may be one copy amongst those 200 'Epic Movie' DVDs in your local blockbuster.

2009, Week 12 & 13

I hope I haven't offended The Elders of the Internet by not posting a weekly ramble last week. Some stuff happened that my head is struggling to filter properly. If this was a private diary I would probably write about it, but it's not. I've always said this diary/blog was to act as a memory warm-up in years to come, and i'm pretty sure that I've said enough to bring things back. Needless to say, if God does exist, he/she/it can go fuck himself/herself/itself with a big stick.

We've got a new family on the street and they've moved into our loft. For the last two weeks we've been woken up at 6am by birds scratching on the roof of the bedroom. Banging on the roof seems to stop the scratching for a while. A few minutes later the noise promptly starts up again, just as you get to that sweet spot when your minds starts drifting into dreamy nonsense.

One Sunday we were woken at 6am and I snapped. I stalked around the bedroom in my pants (good look) trying to work out exactly where the avian arsehole was. Once I found the bastard I smaked the roof, hard. There was silence for a few seconds and then all hell broke loose, baby birds screeching and the mum going crazy. Jen's taken to hitting the roof before we go to bed, see how they like being woken up! I really hope for our sanity and our loft's hygene they go soon.

The weekend before last was dominate by weddings. Saturday was my Cousin's wedding in Great Misenden and probably the first time I've seen almost all of the extended family for years. I'm quite anti-social, generally avoiding contact with people I don't talk to much (less anti-social, more lazy-social) but I think I had a brief conversation with everyone, which is an achievement for me. I forget how cool they all are. I think I'll make more of an effort from now on.

Sunday was a wedding fayre at the now dead-cert wedding reception venue. We keep flip-flopping between having a large invite-everyone-we've-ever-met wedding and having an intimate, close family and friends wedding. It's looking likely that we're going for the later. I think it's a mistake when a wedding becomes more about making other people happy, especially when many of those other people aren't (comparatively) that important to your life and relationship. Also, there's more money to spend on the Honeymoon and as we want to get half way round the world for at least 3 weeks we need all the money we can get.

This weekend Martin & Sarah came up and we all went out for some Japanese, Cocktails and Dancing. Well, lack-lustre dancing in a pretty much deserted Echos. Going to a night club at 11pm is a really bad idea. Especially because when you're literally the first people in the place the booze fueled facade doesn't exist. I can understand the toilets looking a state at 3am once it's been assaulted by inebriated students, but it's a bit worrying when there is mud coated up one of the cubical doors when you're the first person in. And where does the mud come from? the place is in the middle of a decidedly concretey town centre. Maybe they ship it in from Manchester to complete the shitty indy club from the early 90's look. Quality establishment.

As usual my head was banging the next day. People always say don't mix your drinks, so what idiot invented cocktails?

2009, Week 11

Short entry this week. It's a predictable and well versed observation, but hangovers get a lot worse, a lot quicker once you hit a certain age. Two days after going out, I still feel like crap.

A few days after my Birthday, I learnt that your mental powers start declining at 27. I have now reached my mental peak and it's all down hill from here. I regularly walk around looking for keys that are in my pocket. My brain is at its optimum. I watched an hour of TV yesterday and realised in last ten minutes that I've seen it before, very recently. If I can't get into MENSA now, I never will. I'm afraid. I don't want to be anymore of an idiot then I am already.

To help my body on its way to terminal idiocy we 'got our binge on' Saturday night under the guise of post birthday drinks. So that's Orange Tree, Moon & Bell and then everyone's favourite sticky floored club, Echos with Jen, Scott, John and Becky.

As usual John got me into trouble by telling Jen things that were only meant to be between him and me. That is, something I wrote on the blog last week. Apparently the term 'clam-fest' could be construed by some as offensive, so I shall not be using it again. I don't think it's wise to say something that could potentially cause offense, I'd much rather be sure of it.

As I was waving goodbye to the 26 year old me, I decided to also say goodbye to some treasured frequencies by standing next to the world's worst speaker in Echos. For the first and very probably the last time in my life (I'm not a slut, it just doesn't ever happen) I 'shooed off' a woman who asked John and I to dance by derogatorily waving my hand at her. My reasons were honourable, I don't think Jen should come back and see me dancing with some random girl. And she was rotund. She gave me a dirty look, some sort of 'don't go there' palm and walked off, which I think was fair enough. John's classic response was 'well, that didn't go well for any of us'.

And that's it for this week. I could rant about Tescos and my scratched up copy of Fallout3, but I really don't have the energy. If you ever have a scratched game, go to Blockbusters and they'll repair it for a few quid. Just don't shout at the staff when they ask you if you moved your xbox when it was on. You may know that you're joking, but the person behind the counter hitting the panic button doesn't. They give you funny looks and it makes you feel a little bit smaller inside. I blame my newly initiated mental decline.

2009, Week 10

Birthday Week!!! 4 day weekend!!! Unnecessary exclamation marks!!! Despite the excitement I expertly portrayed in the previous sentence, I had forgotten it was my birthday and continued to forget when it arrived. That's not really a surprise as I spent half of last year thinking I was 27 until Jen pointed out that I was 26. That really made my week.

For our birthday weekend we had a mini-break in London Village. We left late Wednesday evening and crashed at my sister's flat in Peckham, which is unfortunately not in the classy Nelson Mandela House (one can only dream).

On the over-ground in to London Thursday morning we had a Mary Poppins style welcome, as we watched some mad gypsy dancing with an umbrella outside of his caravan. I reckon this is the Mayor's new initiative to welcome tourists to London, paying gypsies to relive famous London scenes. Hell, it was more entertaining then a Routemaster that transformed into a, erm, Routemaster with its top floor blown off. Rewatching and describing that video, I've just realised how unintentionally offensive it is.

We'd hired an apartment for a few days. The first apartment we checked into had no hot water and a broken TV. After a wait for someone to turn up we were moved into a two bedroom apartment which was huge and had two bathrooms. We could both go toilet at the same time! Happy Birthday Us! The apartment was in a great location - This is the view of The Old Bailey we had 20 seconds from the apartment.


That evening we went to see Dirty Dancing - The Classic Story on Stage, my present to Jen (both the tickets and me sitting through it). It was, to say the least, the complete opposite of a sausage-fest. Let's call it a clam-fest. The show itself was technically smart but I think for someone who is not a fan (ie me), overlong and badly scripted. All the XX chromosomes' seemed to have fun though, whooping at the exemplary word-smithery such as 'I carried a watermelon' and 'Nobody puts baby in the corner'. Oh and fake-Swayze looked worrying old to be seducing a teenager. And he had funny hair.

Next day I dragged Jen on a walk around The Cirty, checking out St. Pauls (Huge!), The Globe Theatre and the current Turbine Hall exhibition at the Tate Modern, 'TH 2058' AKA 'Big Scary Spider and some Bunk Beds'. Here's some piccys.





Before lunch (a wise move) we went to The Hunterian Museum, a collection of various animals and body parts, mostly in Jars, collected by John Hunter throughout his life. It was fascinating, but unfortunately somewhere in the Royal College of Surgeons dinner was being served. So whilst we were viewing the insides & outsides of featuses, babys and adults, humans and non, we were getting a lung full of pie and mash. The shear scale of the main 'Crystal Gallery' finished us off and we had to get out for some fresh air and some tapas. On reflection, The Hunterian Museum was a bit like anatomical tapas.

In the evening we went to Adam Buxton's 'Out of Focus Group C' at the BFI Southbank. It is, as Buxton puts it '...basically an excuse for me to show some old and new video morcels I’ve made in between live performances from myself and other more talented actors, comedians and musicians'. And it was hilarious. Special guests were Doc Brown (comedian/rapper), Young Knives (who played 'Terra-forma' and 'Turn Tail', before backing Famous Guy for a rendition of 'I Like to Rock') and Kevin Eldon.

We finished the weekend by Chilling back at sis' and watching the ridiculously entertaining 'Taken', where Liam Neeson beats the shit out of anything on two legs for a few hours. I think he might be the new Seagal.

On our travels we had a new RCS (Rubbish Celebrity Spotting) to add to the list - that bloke off of that program in the flat with Samantha what's-her-name and that guy called Martin. Or, after some research, Ben Chaplin from 'Game On'. This spot is almost as good as Tim Vincent at a petrol station. Almost.

2009, Week 9

It's been one of those weekends that feels like it's over before it's began. That's probably down to lack of sleep, much alcohol and the take-away sweats.

John, Jen and I went to see Watchmen on Friday at Vue, Leicester, a cinema I loathe yet keep going back to. John's twisted mind can make the pre-trailer adverts entertaining, if not a little wrong on all levels. If you ever wanted to make an anti-advert, one which ensured no one bought your product, John is your man. Also, he made quite possibly the funniest ghost train related joke. Unfortunately I think If I committed it to the Internet's It guaranteed me an appointment with Beazlebub for eternity. Or maybe the big G likes paraplegic based comedy. Better not risk it.

Watchmen was long yet entertaining, if not a little tonally unbalanced. I think Snyder had a difficult Job; either make a film that is true to the novel yet a bit of a mess or radically veer away from the source material to make a more cohesive and ultimately accessible film. Either way you're going to piss off the fanboys or the critics. Despite the change to the ending (for the best I think) the film kept as close to the comic as possible for a big budget movie (ha! i said comic, not graphic novel. in your face fanboys!).

As Jen was wedding dress shopping on Saturday I had a loose end. I ended up in a Garden Centre with the 'rents which oddly enough it was my suggestion. The 21 year old me would be severely disappointed by my over enthusiasm to buy rhododendron compost. In fact the 26 year old me is very disappointed.

Saturday night was a pre-birthday pub crawl. Does 3 pubs count as a crawl? OK, pre-birthday pub stroll. I haven't seen Christof or Chris since my brother's wedding and I could quite happily talk rubbish with them into the early hours. Which I did, although according to Jen towards the end it was mostly me talking rubbish at them when everyone wanted to go sleep. Over excited I guess. As usual I put my foot in it, joking with Chris that the good thing about Game Station stores (one of which he manages) is that unlike every Game store I've ever been in it doesn't smell so bad that you gag when you walk in. Unfortunately, I completely forgot his girlfriend who was sitting next to him works in Game. I've done much worse though, some of which I'm too embarrassed to write down. If you want to know ask me about the drunk guy at the Who gig. We can go to hell together.

We had quite a few drinks in the Old Market, Kettering's most alternative alternative pub. Although maybe I need to re-evaluate that, because for at least two hours it was, erm, 'eclectic', at one point pulling out the Hammer & Ice combo of 'Can't Touch This' followed by 'Ice Ice Baby'. The audacity. And there was also a complete pub sing along of Chas & Dave's 'Rabbit', which was beauty in its purist form.

I'm too tired to write anymore, I'm almost 27 don't you know?

2009, Week 8

To misquote the seminal work of the early 21st century's portentous rock poets Sum 41, this week is 'all filler, no killer', in that bugger all happened. This was, I like to think, by choice. As we have big plans for the next few weekends Jen and I decided to laze around the house, watch films, drink wine 1 and eat Jamie Oliver's Tiramisu2.

My new keyboard turned up this week. Stupidly, I didn't consider that it would be the same width as, if not wider than an actual piano. Because of this I've struggled to find it a permanent home. It's great though, and I wish i'd of got one when I started self-teaching last year. It's got USB MIDI, which let me hook it up to Garageband in minutes and take advantage of the great instrument sets such as 'Nature Sounds', 'Comedy Noises' and the must have 'Applause and Laughter'. I am the master of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. I own that bitch.

As preparation for our trip to London Village in a few weeks I got a copy of the 'Rough Guide to London'. It's amazing how little you really see in a city without a guide book. I've spent many days aimlessly walking around central London yet upon looking at the guide book I realise that I've missed so many interesting things. For example, did you know that there is a lamp post near The Strand that is powered using methane collected from the sewage system? I thought not my friend, and you thought the Houses of Parliment are impressive? You fool!

Every so often I re-discover an album that I've bought and never really got into the first time round. Oddly enough, these albums tend to go on to become the ones I really love. I think this is because music that is initially difficult to get into or challenges the listener's conceptions ultimately has a greater pay off when you finally 'get it'. In the last few years this has happened with Midlake's 'Van Occupanther' (which I now adore) and Animal Collective's 'Strawberry Jam'. The last few weeks I've really got into the second Hot Chip album 'Made in the Dark', which I've had since release. I was initially disappointed with it, I think mainly because the lead single 'Ready for the Floor' was a bit too mainstream and that stupidly put me off the album. On reflection though, the album really is a funky bitch.

I've come up with a new nick name for Jen and it's a personal fave. I'm pretty sure in every relationship there are weird nicknames used to refer to either partners, which make absolutely no sense to anyone else. What is odd with Jen and I is that the names seem to change every month. For example, here's all the ones we could think of from the last few years: Jen, Jen-Meister, Jenny, Jennifer, Jennifer Jayne, JJ, JBoss, Abraham, JJ Abrahams, Jabraham, Jabraspam, Jables, Balls, Jables Power, Gorper-chov and my new personal favourite, J-Chops.

I'll finish with some wise words imparted from my soon-to-be brother in law.

Wise man say even crouching ginger can't hide because of his carrot topped shame

1 - Man on Wire (great), Strangers (not bad, first half tense but looses its way) and Hunger (brilliant, but really hard work)
2 - Not literally his, I wouldn't mess with the mockney chef. Him and his Toploader pals would beat me to death with drumsticks and then dance on my corpse in the fucking moonlight.

CNPS: 15

2009, Week 7

For a few hours this week, there was a big chance that I had been horribly killed. Well, at least from my from Mum's point of view, as there was a car accident in Loughborough and she happened to hear about it. I'm not complaining, it's nice to know that someone is thinking about you. I do feel sorry for my sister who lives in South London, she must get the 'just checking you're not dead' answering machine message twice a day.

Talking of the afterlife, it turns out that our potential wedding venue, Leicester's Guild Hall, is the most haunted building in Leicester. So haunted in fact that Yvette Fielding and a bunch of morons paranormal researchers have paid it a visit (you can watch the footage on youtube, although you really must have something, anything better to do, don't you?). There's also 'The Best Paranormal Evidence' which was shot at the Guild Hall, which is essentially sped up footage of sun light moving across a floor. These ghostbusters would shit themselves if they ever saw a disco ball in full swing. Oh, and if you really do buy into most haunted, you really have to read this expose of Derek Acorah, it's hilarious.

There's a weird looking monument that we drive past everytime we goto Loughborough, and I really wanted to go check it out this weekend. It's called the 'Temple of Venus' and sits solitary on a hill next to the A512 (picture here). I know it's on the Garendon Park estate which has partly public grounds, but there are no noticable footpaths near the monument. The only useful bit of information I could find was from the knowhere guide:

the venus temple, ... the farmer. whenever u try to cross his field to get to it, he fires his fucking gun! wanker.

Unsurprisingly, I rain-checked the idea and watched The Wire instead. Me being shot dead would only upset my mum and put a real downer on the weekend.

This weekend I really wanted to fix the floorboards in the bathroom. At the moment standing on them feels like being on a ship in stormy weather. It turns out this is because they're badly fitted and dangerously thin. Basically, until I fix them we need to introduce a weight limit on the bathroom. Until normal service resumes, fatties will be redirected to the shed with a bucket. As usual though, I procrastinated upon this all weekend and got absolutely nothing done.

My little sister was annoying me with compliments this week. She'd been listening to my 6th form band demo CD and asking why I don't record songs anymore. Buoyed by her encouragement I restrung my guitar (previous strings were 4 years old) and wrote a song about how I shouldn't write songs anymore. Unintentionally, It was actually a meta-song in that the song itself proved the point of the lyrics. Nevertheless, I ordered a shiny new 88 key 'stage piano' (i.e. keyboard) to try and start learning piano again, something which I started a year ago and quickly abandoned, blaming my previous keyboard and its sticky keys.

Plan next week? Putting some good time into procrastinating about floor boards and pro-actively planning my excuse for giving up on the piano again. After all, you've got to plan if you ever want to get anything done.

CNPS: 15 (stuck)