panic buying!

OH NO! WE ARE GOING TO RUN OUT OF PETROL AND NEVER BE ABLE TO CARRY OUT OUR DAY-TO-DAY TASKS; WHATEVER WILL WE DO?!?!?!

Shall I tell you what we will do? Nothing.

As a nation we've been through two World Wars; we've survived Maggie Thatcher and we've sat through a double dip recession. What do we, as British citizens, actually do about anything? We sit, we make a cup of tea, we take the next most convenient option, and we most certainly don't panic. Let the panic stay in America, let them keep the stereotype of crowds of running, screaming and looting. In Britain we are subdued, we pretend things aren't happening and we most certainly don't panic.

And pasties, God help us all, are being taxed. How could we ever survive? Oh, I know, we could ignore the additional price and just eat them because we like them. Out of the budget there are many things I could complain about; much like last year.

That said, what, if anything, is the point?

anchorman two: a risk worth taking?

THERE IS A NEW ANCHORMAN COMING OUT.

YES. What could possibly be bad about another film in which Ron Burgundy plays the loveable/loatheable role of San Diego's main anchor?

Well, actually, a lot. I hope they do the predecessor justice and that they don't make a cheap imitation akin to the lamentable 'Pirates of the Caribbean 2, 3 & 4' or Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.'

I will be overjoyed if the next film has even an ounce of the quality (or ironic lack of) that anchorman one had; not to be desperately pessimistic but there is a strong possibility they could let us down.

I just don't want to be upset; anchorman is, after all, one of the best films of my generation.

hip-hip-hip-hooray/let's get messy in the sunshine!

It's March; and the sun, as my title eludes to, has got his hat on.

It's warm! I'm loving the nice weather, and now that I've finished my essay I can actually enjoy it (and, y'know, ignore the pile of work that's sitting in my bag for the time being...) with a pint.


I mean yes, admittedly, the booze, whilst freely flowing does offer a trip into the memory banks and reminds you what things are like when you're sober. Those little niggly issues that all of us want to ignore all the time but never can; those massive issues that control our lives and make us wish we could just hibernate for eternity- they all come out.

Would we change it? Probably not, because as long as the bants are freely flowing we can embrace an evening getting 'merry' and forget the impending repercussions. Then, when we do get irritated by the goings on of our lives, we know it's time to go home, eat some toast and go to bed.

Quintessential British behaviour, in a nutshell.

satyagraha.

Today I have to finish a 2,500 word essay. It will almost certainly be incredibly sunny outside all day and by way of alternative to making use of such excellent weather; I will be cooped up inside the library pretending that the weather is as miserable as I am.


For those of you that are interested, however, I'm doing the essay on Gandhi. Amongst other things, Gandhi was an incredible leader of men. It's actually a bit of a shame that more people don't understand his work or what he did. He used a concept from Hindu/Jain teachings called Satyagraha. Satyagraha was Gadhi's means of nonviolent protest; it's very similar to 'turn the other cheek' from the Bible.


This was most clear during the Great Salt March; in which he protested against taxation on salt. Having walked 241 miles in 24 days (aged 61!) he walked into the sea, collected some salt from a wave, breaking the law as he did so. Then his followers, initially approximately 70 but as the march went on grew to tens of thousands, followed him and did the same. They then took a beating from the British authorities but refused to fight back.

Sorry for the history lesson; blogs will return to normal as of tomorrow.

sunday trading

Sunday trading is, if you work weekends, one of the most irritating things known to man.

For me, in this ever-expanding secularism that we appear to be endorsing rather than just accepting, we should get rid of Sunday trading all-together. Why? Well, it's simple. You are, as a Christian (or Jew, or Muslim who have different Sabbath days) allowed to have the Sabbath off on religious grounds.

So if I could question a cultural issue, why then must we continue to not live our lives as normal just because it's Sunday? I don't like sitting on my backside watching daytime TV but my hand is forced by the fact I can't do anything until 10:30; and there is no reason for this.

The most irritating factor, admittedly, is the days in which you work through the entire trading day; leaving one unable to buy food and thus starving for an evening.

Is starving students really what the Sabbath was for?

daylight saving problems.

I think it's about time we got rid of the daylight saving time system; purely on a selfish 'it seems to always come at an awkward time for me.'

This time last year we were frantically trying to get our portfolios done for our various modules; doing an all-nighter with an extra hour somewhere in the middle is not fun. This year I had a 6AM start to work; which essentially (as far as my body clock is concerned) means I have to get up at 4AM just to get into work. Bad, bad, bad times.

I just don't think an exhausted nation merits whatever it is we actually gain from this lost hour. As for those of you that had a lie in (you know, because it's Sunday and you can) you are the lucky ones; hopefully one day I'll be living it up in a school and not worrying about getting up at a time that is detramental to my sleep patterns.

It's time for sleep, definite bedtime when I finish work.

pound for two games

Last night I went to the SU after a lot of persuasion to get my housemate to join me.

We ended up playing pool all night, not to make a massive point of it, but I didn't lose a game all night, just saying. It was probably to do with the blood-alcohol ratio of my opponents by comparison to mine, the self assigned designated driver.

Also, I have never laughed so much at one game of pool in my life as that of my difficult-to-persuade housemate and my other housemate's missus. It's fair to say I fell on my arse laughing and why?

He played the worst shot in the history of the game. Many can vouch for this; however I am keen to make a point of it myself that he let the pressure get to him, and this made me laugh. Probably harsh, but oh well, do I care? No.

Also, did I mention that I didn't lose a game all night?

anonymous hecklers

As far as challenges go; an active disagreement with somebody's blog is one that I would happily encourage, normally.

The issue I take with this band of hecklers is that they do everything under a disguise. They are happy to insult me and my writing but without the ability to show their face as they do so.

This is fortunate in one sense. It is fortunate for them; as many of my regular readers will be able to look at them and say 'what a freak' (as many have). It is also fortunate for me, because I love a debate, my degree is essentially in analytical argument and thus I find it relatively easy to respond to anything, particularly in writing.

As for the negatives; it is quite insulting. Not the part where they disagree, no, that's relatively simple to contend with, everyone's entitled to their opinion. It's the parts in which people insult my social skills, for example. So this is a challenge; if you consider your social repertoire to be even half of what mine is then don't spend your time sitting in front of a computer screen sending anonymous insults to someone who literally writes blogs because he gets up early in the morning thanks to a broken body clock and needs something to fill the time.

Or you could just show your face and I could at least know who I'm responding to.

why you might annoy me in a spellathon.

As promised, today's post will be, almost entirely, a rant about people's inability to spell.

There are words in the English language that everyone should be able to come to terms with. I often feel like a snob for making a point of the fact that people don't know how to spell words that are just simple. I've always been a good speller; I was the slightly thick kid at the back of the class but somehow the phonetic alphabet was given to me; I'd love to know where from.

As I grew up I found myself able to write rants especially well. Why? Simple. My grammar is good. I know where particular words need to go to make a coherent sentence. How do I know? Again, simple, I listened in school. GCSE English was a goldmine of knowledge that would one day be applicable to me. It has proven to be so, especially considering I'm doing a humanity.

So yes, everyone should be able to spell.

home from home

I decided to go home last night; Middlesbrough home, that is.

Having missed Mother's Day through work, and knowing that my betrothed, Middlesbrough F.C. (UTB), were on TV, I could kill two birds with one stonecould see Mammy for a late Mothers Day love-in and could also do what is arguably one of my favourite things, and watch football with Dad! Win win situation.

I could also see my sisters. For those of you that don't know, I'm a triplet. Having spent every day together for the best part of 18 years its fair to say that I miss them; they're good crack!

I went through a phase of never ringing home earlier in second year; which I wouldn't recommend to anyone. Picking up the phone is the easiest thing to do; especially if you actually like the person on the other end of the line! I didn't realise I was hurting people with what I was doing; thought my life was full; little bit of fact to all  of you uni students; your life isn't full. A pint at the SU might seem like your busy; but nobody is benefiting.

Use your time; copy E.T.; phone home.

girls don't like nice boys

The age of charm has come to an end. Any man who considers himself to be anything less than a whore can agree on that.

I like to consider myself quite a charmer. Buying drinks; talking as if I'm not the only person in my world and just generally hoping to be interesting. The problem I've found recently is that nobody wants that. Girls are happy to walk past the nicest man in the room and go for an absolute anus.

This last Saturday I was standing near a girl (nothing more, just standing near), dancing and presumably complaining about the standard of the music to the people I was with. A man who for all intents and purposes appeared to be a complete stranger came up and slapped her square on the backside. How did she respond? She kissed him.

This is never, nor will it ever be, my style. Gentlemanly behaviour gets us all a long way in life; through jobs, friendships and various other types of relationship, if we actually choose to do it. The issue isn't with being a gent though. The issue is with what people look for. Are people consciously targeting being treated as second rate? "Treat 'em mean keep 'em keen?"

Bollocks. Not in my repertoire. 

purpose

In philosophy we're currently ascertaining whether life has meaning.

Let me save you all the self-discovery; life has meaning because that's what we give it. Regardless of God; regardless of the depths of despair and regardless of pain. Life does have meaning.

How can I prove this? Well, I can't. Honestly wish I could, but it's not something I'm able to do. None of us can. We can, however, conclude that we aren't all nihilists (we don't all reject social norms and principles) and we live by norms and principles. As a result our meaning becomes the way in which we interact with others. If we focus upon ourself then we will end up not having any view on the important things in life and it will follow that we have nothing.

Live through interaction everyone; make life important. People make us who we are.

Or at least that's my angle.

what actually happened.

Okay, I've learned that people have been hearing various stories, reading blogs and learning half a story. This is an excellent medium to tell you exactly what I did. What I did wrong; what wasn't wrong of me and what I'm going to do from now on.

It was Woodside Christmas. Me, my housemates and our girlfriends all shared a Christmas dinner and shared presents with one another.

That was the night that I said 'I love you' too many times.

Weeks that followed left us increasingly distant. I eventually visited and this made a now-common-knowledge anxiety disorder take hold. She was physically sick with nerves as soon as I walked in the door because she couldn't tell me how she felt.

That was when she handed me the letter. The letter that was three sides of A4 but said absolutely nothing. All I took from it was that I was saying those three words too many times. I mean yes; it was Christmas. Yes; I was about to leave for six weeks. But no. Too often.

This caused an issue for me. Limits, for me, are not what a relationship needs. It showed me that we weren't on the same page any more. It showed me that the weeks that followed, in which I would be on placement, would be very difficult indeed.

Over those six weeks we didn't speak much. I had family die and family move to Australia. January 2012 was arguably the worst month I've ever had; she still wasn't there.

So about a fortnight before I was due to come back; we broke up.

I decided to visit a friend (yes, a girl), and she found out. I won't go too far into the contents of what happened, but lets say that even if I was in the wrong on that one, this friend wasn't; but suffered one of the foulest messages I have ever known anyone send a stranger. I responded by telling her exactly why the end had come about and how she had now lost me for good.

Then we made up; out of convenience.

Then she started blogging. To anyone with a shortened understanding of the merits of not being with me be sure to read 'singledom = :) ???' tis an excellent read.

And since then, I've heard that everything I thought was mutual in our break up was in fact false. How do I know it's false? Because she's told good friends of mine an absolute crock of shite.

Apologies everyone, I'm well aware that I said that this wouldn't happen; but now it has and I hope you can merge what you've heard together to realise that I'm not actually the person I'm being painted as.

admittance that childhood is over

Nobody actually wants to grow up. So why not just not do it?

Wasn't life better with that childish exuberance where anything was possible? No romance; no job; no over-excessive workload from university (which, for all intents and purposes, is school).

Even the horrifically hormonal teenage years, with an imbalance of everything and not understanding how your life could possibly fit together. Every argument, every poxy homework and every day where they said that you're not doing enough to do your exams well. Every little niggling emotion of the girls you fancy soon to become common knowledge only to be forced into embarrassment when the lack of reciprocation of the said emotion becomes even more common knowledge; and the eventual realisation that being yourself will never get you anywhere; a conclusion eventually turned on its head when you realise all anyone actually wants in sincerity.

Then the hard work kicks in and society forces us to settle into adult life early. We end up in relationships. We end up twenty-year-olds regretting everything we've done in our lives because our lives only began at sixteen the day that school was over; and four years of regret is enough. I've done utterly stupid things in the past. Been too nice; too harsh; too strong willed; the list goes on.

Life, before sixteen (which wasn't actually proper life, but anyway) was simple; the simple things were fantastic and you could see life as it was meant to be.

Lament for the days, they're dead and gone, the world made it this way.

being considerate

For all of this time I've basically bitten my tongue; I've said a lot of direct things in an attempt to make myself feel better; never directing anything through this blog, nor will I ever.

A blog isn't a place for meaningless rambling; it has to mean something to you. There are, however, implicit regulations. Don't defame anyone. Don't use it for evil. Don't do a Mark Zuckerberg. I generally use it to empty my head of the less important thoughts to allow me room to consider the bigger ones. As a system, this has worked. It hasn't offended anyone, it hasn't made anyone miserable and it hasn't offered any thinly veiled digs. It's always been factual too.

This is me basically saying from today onwards I will continue to show consideration to others in this medium because defamation of character and quietly going about making someone look bad is wrong; and will hurt people. I'm drawing a line under this soap opera that the majority of you will have an awareness of and saying I won't mention it again.

Let's hope for some reciprocation.

messy room

To those of you that don't know, I'm generally an obsessive compulsive cleaner.

This is predominantly my Mammy's fault, having been brought up in the tidiest house IN THE WORLD. Now though, the mess in my room somewhat accurately reflects my life; everything's a bit messy but it'll be relatively easy to clean up. The problem is, I just can't be bothered. I'm appreciative of more when things are messy; I thought I wasn't at first, but I've come to realise that the best way to live your life is without a masterplan; taking each day as it comes.

Admittedly, the mess can't omit too far. If I let people down because I can't keep track of everything then it'll be bad; I return to the key point of almost every other blog I've made, the thing we all need is simplicity. There is such thing as a simple mess. I can do the rudimentary stuff and let the mess go over my head all the time. Simple, yes?

Well, most certainly not. I think its time to tidy up.

under-age

Went out last night to O2 in Leeds for what should be an excellent event, Propaganda.

The problem with it was that it was full of people who weren't old enough to enter the establishment. They'd got in through means of fake I.D. I appreciate that they want to go out but I'm in a very difficult position having taught people of that approximate age whilst on placement.

I planned to have a pleasant evening with a friend and ended up trying to work out who was a fair bit younger than me. Not the best way to spend an evening! So to reiterate, I think that if you want to go out you should.

But if you need parental consent to do so, its probably not your scene.

new game

I've been waiting for SUCH a long time for mass effect 3 to come out. This might sound incredibly nerdy, because it is. Thankfully, I don't care! Its marvellous that every now and again someone can say 'here's a hobby for the next two months, enjoy!' Simply excellent!

I'm not going to sit around on my arse until I get deep vein thrombosis; eating nothing but doritos and living my life through the game. That would be foolish. What I can do, though, is live as I always have, reaping the rewards of a day well spent studying; doing housework; or whatever I seem to have taken my hand to; and knuckling down to an hour or two of mild enjoyment of a game that is, if its predecessors are anything to go by, excellent.

But I'm not playing it yet, I have a hangover from two days spent in Newcastle drinking for birthdays of friends. Excellent time had by all (I hope). 

commuters never smile

I visited Newcastle yesterday, and realised something.

Whatever train/bus/form of public transport you ever get, it is an absolute rarity to see someone smiling. This is not a conclusion I've just come to, it's something I've noticed basically since I started second year at university (and had to get the train pretty much every day). I've tried to change it in the past, by doing something obviously stupid, for example, but still the amount of smilers on the platform remains seldom.

How to fix this? Maybe we'll never know, maybe we're resigned to a life of miserable commutes surrounded by the never-happy (or maybe once-upon-a-time happy) travellers resigned to the fact that they'll never actually get out of the rat race that is public transport.

Conclusion: Keep Smiling.

another bandwagon. the kony issue.

'The next twenty-seven minutes are an experiment"

The majority of us heard it. The majority of us now want to do something about it. Arguably the most potent words we have heard as a nation this year.

The problem is that within those 27 minutes there isn't actually anyone who grapples with what 'invisiblechildren' does, will do or could do. There are flaws.

For example, Kony2012's outgoings against it's profits are minimal. It also supports the Ugandan and Sudanese armies, which are rife with accusations of rape and pillaging. Kony is a bad man, granted, but by supporting 'invisiblechildren' you are indirectly supporting the acts of the armies, which are loathsome.

Naturally, such a bandwagon can have incredible effects. If Kony is caught, and I hope he is, then 'invisiblechildren' will have been a major success.

Just be aware of the cause of what you are following; quite rightly, but quite blindly.

the old fashioned bandwagon

It was a matter of time, was it not, that I would end up passing comment on the free-rolling bandwagon that is blogging? That must be what this blog is about, surely?

NO! 

This bandwagon is much older, and 'bandwagon' is in fact the wrong word, because this is more of a roller-coaster. This roller-coaster is football. How? Because it creates a paradigm in which everyone can be impressed, everyone can have a view and everyone can have a little bit of disdain. So how does this roller-coaster/bandwagon come into play? Well to anyone who watched Arsenal vs. Milan, one would assume you gave 'The Gunners' a fair amount of support.  This can be with no allegiance to them whatsoever, no plans to ever support them, but they were against a side that is not of your own nation, the possibility of the positive experiences of your compatriots is the essence of why you climbed aboard this wagon just before it started rolling.

The same can be said for my club; for those of you that don't know, this is Middlesbrough. After three years in (what we would consider to be) the footballing wilderness we appear to be on our way up. As a once-upon-a-time season ticket holder (that I gave up when I moved to Leeds) this is a very exciting prospect.

Lets hope the hype can be lived up to!

pressure

We all feel pressure. Even those who, like me, pretend we don't.

It's impossible not to get snowed under sometimes, sometimes we need to find a balance in our lives that just isn't possible to locate. Sometimes we need to have more sleep, have a bath, etc..

Personally, I prefer to not obsess over the tiny details in life, leaving room for the massive stuff. Its the predominant reason for this blog. I can get rid of the overspill of thoughts and stick to the stuff I need. If we all look at our lives we'll probably come to similar conclusions, there are overcomplicated factors of our lives that we can do without, but don't because it feels like we're doing the right thing; be that in our uni life, our jobs or our romantic lives.

I'm not suggesting we should close our minds to the world, that's not practical or realistic, but we can, most certainly close off ourselves from what we don't need; once we start doing that we may actually realise the amount we don't need and start living for today.

Which, after all, is all we really can do, because today is all we have, waiting for tomorrow is a gamble.

petrol

I put £10 of petrol into my car last night to go and collect my housemate from work.

The sad reality is that this didn't even give me a quarter tank of petrol. Now admittedly the petrol pin on the Kia Rio is questionable in its accuracy, inasmuch as if I'm driving up a hill I have substantially less petrol than if I'm driving down one. Living in Leeds, which is essentially just a mass of hills, means that I scarcely get an accurate idea of where I can get to on the petrol in my car.

It's a sad state of affairs, not only the price of the petrol itself but the fact that as a nation we seem to just accept it as the norm.

It is not the norm. We pay substantially more than our European neighbours. Even the Greeks, who have no economy to speak of.

Okay, time to do some philosophy, ethics, world religions, peace and peacemaking and New Testament... probably should have done this earlier!

PS, Happy Birthday Booth m'love!

food and drink

Yesterday I received a phonecall from a housemate who I haven't seen for a while. It took no time at all before we decided a trip to the pub was on the cards.

Having not eaten all day it took three bottles of the wonderful desparados to have me a blithering mess, talking absolute nonsense. After my fourth, we got the train and relaised the my car was at Burley Park train station and that I, in my stupour, would not be able to drive. This posed a problem, safe in the knowledge that I had a 7AM shift. Naturally, as always, I concluded that driving was a bad idea, and a risky one, and that I would collect the car in the morning.

This is an excellent thing about the new generation of drivers. Drinking and driving, at least in my friend circles, is condemned as a very bad thing. You not only risk your license and your job prospects but also the lives of yourselves and others. Not a risk worth taking.

So we walked to another pub for some food. I got an embarrasingly small amount of food and this morning I got up ten minutes early and walked to collect my car.

Those of you that wouldn't do that ordinarily, take this as a lesson.

ping-pong

On our travels the other day me and my housemate went to the BIG ASDA.
I've written it like that to hopefully adequately portray the size of it. You take a normal sized supermarket; give it travellators and put another store of the same size underneath it. Complete it by giving it its own McDonald's restaurant and boom, there you have it. Impressive.

We were trying to find presents for Jack (who as I mentioned in a previous post isn't very well) and on our travels stumbled upon a ping-pong set for a pound. PING PONG. A POUND. There was no way we could possibly refuse. We bought it (amongst all of the presents we got for Jack, a list as long as one's arm). Not deterred by the fact it was too small for our coffee table, we put bottles of irn bru on either side. We now challenge anyone to partake in the 'irn bru woodside table tennis tournament.' It will be the finest example of a tournament you have ever seen and I dare any of you to come and have a look.

This is what student life is about. Impulsive, exciting and most importantly simple. Its simplicity is key. This is our last opportunity to live the easy life. I for one will be taking advantage of the easy life until it disappears for good and I wave goodbye to education and hopefully say hello to educating.

Scary, I know, but all the more reason to live for today! 

channel four

It was inevitable, was it not, that there was going to be a little bit of uproar about last nights show 'Make Bradford British?'

This is because they showed a disproportionate amount of negative opinion about the ways in which people think immigrants can contribute to society. It's also not the first thing that the lovely people at C4 have done that has been negatively stereotyping one set of people. I'm not saying I haven't seen racism around. I'm not saying I'm condoning the fact it happens. I'm saying that it is easy to find the negatives in society, but sometimes ignorance is bliss. Sometimes it is better to ignore the blind ignorance that sits just outside your door. Sometimes it is better to accept moronic behaviour as moronic behaviour and just let it go over your head.

Before anyone says that I don't know what discrimination feels like, welcome to the world of a 6"7 man. I'm even discriminated against by inanimate things. Doorways, basement rooms and trousers, all things that cause me physical struggle. I'm not saying that this is as bad as being racially abused, but I've had that too. Being called a 'skinny white boy c##t' was the highlight of a night in Manchester last August.

I'm not saying we should all come together and love each other, I know that there is currently an obvious lack of possibility. I think the modern generation could fix this, so long as the generations that follow are integrated properly, through schooling. But for now, it is a sad state of affairs, but we must just accept what we have.

Because after all, racists are the most bigoted of folk.

friendship

How does one define friendship?

For me, its what you can share with someone. Those little things that nobody else can know and that nobody will discover unless you open up to them? Well yes, but it comes in different forms too. It comes as a mutual agreement that you appreciate each others' company. It comes by chance. Chance is probably the most crucial part. The world isn't pre-determined. Time moves from moment to moment and the only way to look back is through memory (and this is coming from one of the bow-ties-are-cool-brigade) If you make good friends, you're lucky. I have.

What about when friendship goes sour? Arguments, a lack of intent to make it work, differing interests, growing apart? The easiest thing to do is to blame the other person, never speak of it again and move on with your life. It's never that easy. Never. It takes effort, it takes intent, it takes a realization that you'll miss that person in your life. Most of all it takes a mutual acceptance. Mutuality is to friendship what Obama is to presidency (has a lot of good intentions but probably won't stay very long).

The sooner people realise that I'm holding my side of this agreement, the sooner I can get on with my life. Telling me one thing and others another will only hinder things.

Time to sit and wait, I suppose.

P.S. don't know if he's been reading this, but get well soon big Jack! No more red meat on the barbie for you though...